


Cross my Heart

by olimakiella



Series: The Very Secret Secrets of Running a Successful Department [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Debatable Magic Theory, Generic Russian Bad Guy, M/M, Made up Magic, Media Remix - Movie: Skyfall, Minor Character Death, Morgana's Cafe, Secret Agency - CMI, Sequel, The Centre of Magic Intelligence (CMI), even more Artistic License, nulls, with even more things
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-27
Updated: 2018-04-27
Packaged: 2019-04-27 13:18:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 29,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14426241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/olimakiella/pseuds/olimakiella
Summary: Six months after Harry Potter joins the CMI, the Department is faced with a dangerous man harnessing and selling weapons that are puzzling Muggle and Wizarding Governments.  While they work to stop him, Harry Potter's private mission is turning the Department into an Ian Fleming novel if it kills him.  With his current assignment, however, it just might.





	Cross my Heart

**Author's Note:**

> Hello everyone.
> 
> I've been away for four years. I initially started my four year time out because RL things got in the way and I'd committed to writing a sequel to In Vitro Veritas (which I still haven't finished). I said to myself, 'Self? You need to just lock yourself away and write dammit!' and that worked to an extent, because there are a whole lotta words in a google doc to prove that, but then two months ago, I got a bunny that just wouldn't bloody die. And now, two months later, here's a sequel to and Hope to Die. Hope you like it.
> 
> I want to thank my betas: Lordes - she's awesome and I couldn't live without her. For real. And DiverTaz who stepped in to save a damsel in acute distress. Also the HP Lexicon for giving me actual names of actual students to populate this damn Department. The HP Wiki, too, for all the spells and potions ingredients I couldn't remember. Google maps, *kisses peace sign to the heart* you're my main squeeze. Google translate, you're good for my made up latin spells that the Wiki didn't have, so thanks for that too. To the wonderful Facebook group of AO3 writers, thank you for everything. It’s been amazing to vent, rant, complain and get my hand held through French vocabulary lessons with people who understand that the struggle is real.
> 
>  **Disclaimer** : All Harry Potter characters herein are the property of J.K. Rowling and Bloomsbury/Scholastic. No copyright infringement is intended. I also don't own anything to do with James Bond. Just in case. Oh I also don't own any car brands. Just saying' *shrug*
> 
>  **Warnings** : Just to be clear, the mature rating is a warning for some violence and also some potential triggers in the case of explosions etc. There are more gratuitous expositions on magic where even more artistic license has been taken. Also, blatant made up things. You'll know it when you read it. There's a glossary type list at the end, of spells used in the fic. If you want anything added to it, let me know.

  
******“Set patterns, incapable of adaptability, of pliability, only offer a better cage.**  
**Truth is outside of all patterns.**  
**― Bruce Lee, Tao of Jeet Kune Do.** ”

Consciousness came slowly, the whorling pattern of the grid-panelled ceiling swimming in and out. Harry blinked in the light of the room and looked around once everything stayed in place, feeling the slight thump-thump of a headache behind his right eye. It was warm here. A blessed relief simmered in him, making him relax further into the mattress with a sigh. If it was warm here, then he definitely wasn’t out _there_. Not anymore. That could only mean that Draco had found him. His brow furrowed a moment, his forehead creasing in thought. There was something he needed to... He turned, seeing small movement in the corner of his eye.

“He awakens.” The book on Draco’s lap was shut softly, his finger holding his place.

Harry raised his head a little to take Draco in, his previous thought leaving him. The blond looked dishevelled, as if he hadn’t moved for ages. “Where...” His voice was croaky when he tried to speak. Hearing a beep, Harry looked around and saw Theo Nott reading from a clipboard. He sighed and let his head fall back on the pillow. “Your Medbay.” Of course, where else would he be? Story of his life.

Theo cocked an eyebrow over the clipboard. “ _My_ Medbay, I thank you.”

Harry huffed an amused breath. “Sorry, Theo.” He turned his head on the pillow to look at Draco again. “You’re deciding on how to greet me, aren’t you? Am I in a lot of trouble?”

Draco stared, the slight mar on his brow the only thing showing his concern for how Harry sounded. “Guess.”

Harry winced but had a go anyway. He shut his eyes. “No?” he said in a hopeful tone, turning to send a baleful stare toward Theo for his snort of amusement.

Draco simply stared some more, but his eyes narrowed a little this time. “Guess again.”

“Okay,” Theo declared awkwardly. “Well, you’re alive and awake. My job is done.” Harry snapped his attention to Theo with an edge of desperation. That sounded a lot like he was about to abandon him. Theo ignored him and focused on Draco. “We really need to hire a Mediwizard or something if our missions are taking this kind of turn. I’ll talk to Blaise, see if we can start outsourcing. Try not to kill him, yeah?” When Draco turned his narrow-eyed gaze on him instead, Theo backtracked. “But... know if you do, it’s well within your right.” A cocked eyebrow was his only reply. “Okay...” he concluded. “Bye.” Theo beat a hasty retreat.

The silence felt heavy and filled with tension. Harry couldn’t help but fill it with words. It amazed him sometimes how, without even speaking, Draco could convey enough emotion to make you feel apologetic for your actions. “So angry you can’t even speak. I am very much in trouble.”

There was silence, and then quietly, “You didn’t listen to me.”

Harry turned his head on the pillow. Draco was still as a sentry. “Draco-”

Draco shut his eyes as if the motion alone could ward off any excuse Harry came up with. Oh, he _was_ in trouble. “Abram Kuznetsov is _dangerous_.” Draco spoke slowly. He finally opened his eyes and Harry wished he hadn’t. The flinty grey of Draco’s irises cut into him like daggers. “He’s killed so many Muggle Operatives that have been sent after him...” Draco trailed off. Harry didn’t fill the silent space with anything this time, letting it sit. Seeing Draco so angry, to the point he was choosing his words carefully, was when you shut up and let him speak. “It’s become so bad that the Muggle Government turned to us because they can’t afford to let him kill anymore of their agents and then disappear like he’s made of air. He leaves behind collateral damage and this time was no different, except he almost took you with him. It’s... most frustrating.” Harry had a feeling that wasn’t the word Draco really wanted to use. “If he wasn’t a Muggle I could swear...”

Harry gasped and lay back staring at the ceiling, the memory from his mission finally coming to him. That’s what he’d forgotten when he woke up. “He’s not.”

The sharp look Draco directed to him could have sliced him in half. “What?”

Harry met that gaze regardless. “He’s got magic. It’s why I had to stay instead of following your orders. I suspected it, but I had to make sure.” The amount at stake for the intelligence gathered on his mission was evident in the briefing he’d attended prior to leaving for Berlin. He winced as he tried to sit up, welcoming Draco’s hands as he helped him upright. “Muggles wouldn’t have known that he was a Wizard, so they couldn’t have passed on the information. They wouldn’t know what to look for and, even if they did, it's likely they wouldn’t see it anyway.” He conveyed how serious this was as he stared at Draco. “He’s not untrained like Madley was, he has _perfect control_. He just doesn’t use it often,” he recalled, seeing Kuznetsov, in his mind, standing in the middle of the warehouse and stumbling over unfamiliar words. Once the words came out correctly, though, the spell worked perfectly.

Draco leaned back in the visitor’s chair and tipped his head back to look at the ceiling. “Dammit. We’ll have to change our strategy.” He sat up suddenly and picked up his Personal Frame, the miniature six-by-four version of the Mainframe all the Unit Heads of the Department used for communication, among other specialised things. “He might have gone to a Wizarding School,” Harry heard him mutter to himself.

“Mmm,” Harry said, contemplative. He watched Draco work for a moment more, feeling the same warmth inside that he always felt when Draco was around him. “I _am_ sorry I disregarded your orders, Draco,” he said softly his fingers playing with the texture of the blanket that covered him. “I’ll take the reprimand, even if you have to do it on the Ops main floor.” He’d ignored a direct order, not only from his Unit Head but the Head of Department, too. That couldn’t go without sanction. Draco couldn’t pick favourites.

Draco raised his head to look at him, his eyes narrowing slightly as he took in Harry’s contrite expression. It was a well-known fact that Draco demanded excellence from all who worked for him, as well as from himself. His anger didn’t stem from Harry not following his orders so much as the fact that it got him hurt. He knew that Harry was aware of that. Just like he knew that if Harry hadn’t been hurt, and he’d been able to communicate his suspicions earlier, Draco would have let him stay longer to ascertain whether his suspicions were true. The fact remained that Harry went dark (without warning as he stepped into Kuznetsov’s warehouse) to observe, got into a situation that he couldn’t escape and ended up stranded for three days in a frigid Winter with no magic to help him. Draco let his Frame rest on his knees, the screen showing a request for Theo to get his Research Technicians working on finding Kuznetsov’s history. “The only thing you need to worry about right now is healing.” Harry had a feeling that was as close to verbal forgiveness as he would get. Draco stood up. “You should be good by tomorrow. I’ll come by later.” He gestured to the door. “Someone wants to see you.”

Harry turned his gaze to the door and smiled at Robert Hilliard, also known in the Department as Operative 5. Robert nonsensically knocked on the door as Draco exited, giving his boss an acknowledging nod as he left. “Hey medical prisoner buddy,” he joked, addressing Harry. “I hear you’re on a short term sentence.” Harry snorted and gripped his side when he did. Robert winced with him. “Ooh, that looked painful, no making you laugh then.” Robert sat down in Draco’s vacated chair and put up a foot on the side of Harry’s bed. “Saw the highlight reel for your mission. That sucked, I’m sorry.”

“Not as much as yours,” Harry said eyeing the floating potion bag that followed Robert around these days when he wasn’t training. Theo was still conducting experiments to see if he could manifest Robert’s magic faster, it seemed. He wondered what was in the bag this time. Any spell used on Robert so far was ineffective and potions taken orally were useless. Only intravenous feeds of potions seemed to have any visible effect, his magic rising up to protect him from the internal onslaught with a physical reaction. Theo had started with relatively mundane potions, working his way up the scale to see what Robert’s magic would do. So far it was overreacting to everything, knocking down and forcing out any foreign substance that entered his bloodstream. Harry hadn’t seen a man use the bathroom or get fevers so often.

Robert looked up at the bag and tugged on it once, watching it rise up to its proper level, above his heart, like a helium balloon when he let it go. He shrugged. “Well, Unspeakables, right?” Harry rolled his eyes as Robert gave him a charmed ‘what can you do, eh?’ grin. “We all know they only asked for one of us thinking the boss would send you. After their embarrassing contribution last year, when they couldn’t apprehend Madley, we knew they’d want to get their own back eventually. Malfoy warned me well ahead of time. He also said he could send someone else if I wasn’t comfortable being the precedent he had to set.” His brow quirked. “Think that’s why I volunteered regardless. Man actually gave me a choice instead of an order.”

“Precedent?” Harry queried.

Robert gave Harry a knowing grin. “Our fearless leader is severing our mission partnership with the Unspeakables.” Harry’s eyebrows rose in surprise. “Says we have seven operatives now, and we usually go out in teams of five for big jobs anyway, barring availability. With the training you’ve been engaging us in, Harry, we really don’t need them, but the boss had no way of saying that without sounding petty. He also wants to limit the equipment that leaves the Department in requisitions.” He gestured to himself. “With the Unspeakables’ negligence, he can quote my situation, as well as my Pensieve memories, as evidence to sever the partnership for good.” He grinned. “It’s quite exciting actually, being an almost-martyr for a cause.” He burrowed himself further into the chair and put up his other foot, crossing them at the ankles.

Harry breathed out a flummoxed sigh. He asked Draco months ago why they still worked with the Unspeakables if they truly didn’t like them. When Draco told him it was because the Unspeakables had Mission Training the CMI couldn’t counter, Harry had rolled his eyes and started training the other six operatives himself. They were mainly used for infiltration and observation, so he began with the same skills taught to Aurors in training. When he’d worked with the Unspeakables during the Harlow Madley case six months ago, none of them had exhibited any sort of specialist training that he could see. It made no sense to continuously work with a group of people that the entire Department found distasteful. Naturally, the Unspeakables didn’t take the gradual separation well and uncharacteristically asked for a ‘trained operative’ two weeks ago to aid them in an exercise. Draco had seen through it immediately and Harry had been tied up in intelligence gathering with Abram Kuznetsov in Berlin. Robert had volunteered and Draco, seeing an opportunity like a true Slytherin, had conspired with the Ravenclaw to achieve a long sought-after goal. Harry smiled.

“Huh,” he said resting his head back and felt a cool sensation creep by his ear. He didn’t even have to look. “Hey, Blue.” The manifestation of Draco’s Wild Magic didn’t respond, and Harry didn’t expect it to, but he watched Blue stretch comically from his pillow to the rails of the Medbay bed with a smile. Draco had obviously sent him to watch over Harry while he was busy. Harry raised a hand to the part of the rail he could reach, already inexplicably tired, and clung on with his index and middle fingers.

Robert cocked his head to the side and snorted in amusement. Harry and Draco’s relationship was a badly kept secret in the Department. They kept it professional, of course, but, honestly, Draco’s minions revelled in Harry’s arrival and the fact he kept their boss from going ‘Full on Mad Evil Genius’. Their favourite part of the relationship, however, was that Draco’s ex, Unspeakable Lexley, despised Harry with a fiery passion of a thousand burning suns and Harry, true Gryffindor that he was, relished in it and even encouraged it sometimes. “That little guy has a soft spot for you, hasn’t he? Follows you around all the time.”

Harry watched the blue mass of energy roll along the bars of the hospital bed and ran a finger down what he’d estimate was Blue’s back. “Guess so,” he said absently, mesmerised by the colours swirling around in the translucent blob. “So, tell me, how are the other missions going?”

Three days later, when he was given a clean bill of health and was less instinctually careful of movement that might hurt, Harry managed to pass the standard Field Operative battery of tests (that he’d implemented himself). Later, Harry actually put his door to use by unlocking it with the key and throwing his bag of clothes down inside. He switched on the light and sighed, leaning against the door when he got it closed, and instantly felt his magic disperse throughout his flat as if it, too, was relaxing in the familiar environment.

Magic Fatigue, as Theo had diagnosed him, wasn’t something he’d experienced before. Somehow, Kuznetsov was creating ‘no magic zones’ - similar to how Nulls functioned, but completely man-made - around all his compounds and, as soon as Harry set foot in one, Draco’s voice had cut off completely. He knew the blond would have been in his ear yelling - screaming - at him to get out, but he couldn’t, not without giving away his position. Kuznetsov and his men hadn’t seen him during their - admittedly impressive and very paranoid - round the clock guard rounds and, thanks to Harry disregarding orders, it had stayed that way.

For three days in Berlin. During winter. Without his magic.

When Kuznetsov’s men evacuated the warehouse he’d been trapped in, Harry snuck out into the freezing February evening, blindly crossing the Null zone boundary. When his magic returned to him, it wasn’t gradual like when he took the long way from Draco’s home. Nor was he able to moderate its return, as he’d learnt to do with Blue the last few months when he flooed directly to the Department from Wiltshire. This time he’d been away from his magic for seventy-two hours instead of overnight and he couldn’t fight the elastic snap of it slotting into place all in one go.

The burn of it had knocked him out for hours and he’d woken up freezing from the bitter cold, feeling a strain on his magic as it tried to respond to him. It was frightening and unlike anything Harry had felt before. He almost believed he could die there, frozen, because Draco couldn’t find him. The Magic Fatigue felt like dragging his magic through molasses to get it to answer to him, but he’d eventually managed to activate his Tracker. The Evac-Team _Apparated_ in to find him minutes later and brought him home, but those few hours before, lying there isolated, were some of the scariest he’d encountered.

Draco said he didn’t know why getting his magic back this time differed to usual, but he was working on it. He maintained, though, that keeping Harry’s Wild Magic Signature on file was dangerous if anyone ever got hold of it. Harry disagreed, knowing from experience that having it was the only way to ensure Draco would ever be able to find him. He’d have to think of a way around it.

Harry heaved a sigh as he took in his entrance hall, its familiar colour, the silence and the scent of his home. A sense of calm was creeping through him, relaxing him. He could feel every inch of it with the hypersensitivity of his magic, now that it was back and in full working order. Theo said it would level out soon, but Harry was grateful for it really. It sounded clingy, but its overreaction more than made up for the sluggish pull of before and made him feel safe.

And then his magic met with a presence in his living room.

Harry had his guard up immediately. Turning the corner, he looked inside and breathed out in relief, but mostly surprise.

“Ron?” He dropped his hands. “Christ, I could have killed you.” He turned back to the entrance hall momentarily and threw his keys into the bowl there. It was odd, that his magic didn’t recognise his best friend. Had it been that long?

Ron sat in the corner seat of Harry’s sofa reading, one arm up on the back resting. He obviously found Harry’s reaction just as confusing, his expression showing as much. “Killed me?” he asked. “For being in your flat when you gave me a key?”

Harry opened his mouth to explain before he realised he couldn’t and shook his head instead. Tea. He needed some tea. This was going to be a difficult conversation. “Nevermind. What’s going on?” He heard the rustling behind him as Ron followed him into the kitchen.

“Got the roster for this month.” He put his robe on the counter and crossed his arms over his chest. “You weren’t on it. Again.” His nonchalant tone spelt danger, Harry knew. Ron was far from calm. “Found out today it’s because you resigned after your leave of absence.” He watched Harry slump against the island. “You took time from work, that’s fine. After you helped on that Unspeakables’ case and had that mighty smash up outside the Minister’s office, I don’t blame you.” Harry reached for a cup so Ron wouldn’t see his wince at the lie Kingsley and Draco had come up with as an excuse for him being there. “But I’ve seen you around the Ministry with people I don’t know. You said you were ‘travelling’,” Ron quoted doubtfully, air quotations and all, “whatever that means - and learning how to deal with your magic, but you’ve completely gone off grid, Harry. And now this? You didn’t even think to tell me you quit? Or Hermione? It’s been _six months_ , we’ve been worried sick!” Ron pulled up a stool and sat down, taking a deep breath. When he was calmer, he started again. “You barely talk to us when you are around and... I’ve been here for five hours every day this last week.” Harry looked up at him in shock. “You aren’t here.” He waited, giving Harry a once over. “And - no offence - but you look like shit.”

Harry laughed at the non sequitur. Laughter was a common occurrence whenever he was around Ron for any amount of time. Angry as Ron was, he could obviously see that Harry was upset. That whatever he was hiding, it was hurting him. It was ingrained in their relationship to relieve any kind of hurt by now, and the man knew him too well to not respond to that, even if Ron was upset too. Harry bowed his head to his chest, feeling exhaustion and sadness taking over him from a long two weeks. There was a burning behind his eyes. The scraping of a stool drew his attention, but he didn’t move until he felt Ron stand beside him, joining him in watching the flames under the kettle on the stove. His words were quiet when he spoke. “I can’t help if you won’t talk to me, mate.”

Harry shook his head. “I don’t need help, Ron.” _I need to tell you what I am, what I’ve been doing... but I can’t._

Ron sighed as if he’d pulled the thoughts from Harry’s mind. “Alright. Can you at least tell me where you’ve been?”

 _Poland, Belarus, nearly died in Berlin, all in the last month, but, no, I can’t tell you that either._ “I’m an Unspeaka-”

“No, you’re not,” Ron said in a flat tone.

He’d meant to joke, but inexplicably felt offended at the blatant disregard of his lie anyway. He turned to his best friend with a frown. “Wha- I _could_ be.”

Ron didn’t bother to doubt his previous assessment. “Not standing here in front of me, you couldn’t. You’d be on the ground writhing in pain for breaking your vow of silence, if you were.” Ron twisted to face his best friend and leaned against the counter again. “Stop lying to me.”

Harry felt his insides twist. He took a deep breath. Let it out. “I can’t.”

Ron stared at him for a moment and then nodded once. He stood up, throwing his robe over his arm. He pulled out his wand. “Let me know when you can.” He spun in place, _Apparating_ away.

Harry squeezed his eyes tightly shut in the silence following the crack of Apparition. He sniffled and swiped his hand across his eyes to get rid of the moisture, and took in a shuddering breath this time. Sometimes, he really hated his job.

The Operations Unit in the Centre of Magical Intelligence was as chaotic as it always was. Harry watched Draco, the Head of the Department, give out five different sets of instructions to twelve people in two minutes before he turned to answer Harry’s question of where he would be going next. “It’s a waiting game for now. Until we sort all this out, I’ll be sending you in blind. We have eyes on his home in Bulgaria through the Muggle cameras and the overkill security system he has there. Although, when we sent Six out there a few weeks ago, he couldn’t find the place, so it’s likely to be under a _Fidelius_.”

Harry’s hands combed through his hair scratching idly at his scalp. “Shit. So what do you want me to do?”

Draco thought for a second. “You can go down to Theo if you want. He may have some new items you can test for him.”

“Huh,” Harry said leaning back on the desk. “Sounds like a plan.” He leaned back on his hands. “He was developing some new versions of the Trackers to send up to the DMLE, might be useful to learn how they work.” _And try to work out how we can tweak them to work for me,_ he didn’t say out loud.

Draco cocked an eyebrow and turned to go, pausing when his six by four Personal Frame flashed to show he had a message. “Yeah,” he said distracted. “Have fun.” He looked up at the office directly across from his upstairs, the long wall of glass symmetrical to his own. He tapped his finger to the magic encased in the frame and began sending a message back with a _Flagrate_ charm.

Harry got up, eyebrows furrowing in confusion when his right hand wouldn’t move. He turned to see Blue holding onto his hand where it rested on the desk. The blue mass was purple where it touched Harry’s skin, reacting to his magic like it always did. And Harry felt the uncommon warmth of it surrounding the appendage. It tingled. “Hey,” he said with a fond smile and crouched down. He tried tugging his hand away, frowning slightly when it wouldn’t move. “Er, Draco?”

“What?” the blond replied absently. Harry turned as much as he could and rolled his eyes when he saw Draco hadn’t even bothered to look up.

“Blue won’t let go of my hand,” he said pointedly.

As usual, when Blue was mentioned, Draco responded immediately. “What?” The reply was sharper now, as if Draco just registered what Harry was saying. He put down the Frame and walked over. As he did, he saw a small ball of light come out of Blue and hit Harry in the chest as if the blue mass had thrown it.

“Hey,” Harry laughed. “That tickled.” And, inexplicably, Harry conjured an identical ball of light and threw it at Blue in retaliation.

“What are you-” Draco stopped, hands dropping to his hips. “For Merlin’s sake.” Blue had let go of Harry’s hand and caught the ball, arching to lob it back.

Harry caught it. He looked at Blue, looked at the ball and then back at Blue. “Aww. You bored too?” He dragged over the nearby chair. “Okay, I have some time, let’s play.”

“Harry, stop harassing him.”

Harry looked offended, staring up at the blond from his seat. “He stopped me, not the other way around. Maybe you should pay some more attention to him, he won’t have to search me out at all.” He turned back when a small ball hit him in the side of the head. “Hey! I’m not complaining, Blue.”

Draco rolled his eyes and left them to it, picking up his Frame and heading upstairs. He turned left instead of right at the top and knocked on Blaise’s office door.

“You rang?” Draco said as he walked into Blaise’s office. Theo’s head turned to him from the sofa he was sitting on along the glass wall that overlooked the Ops floor. His hand raised in a small wave as Draco walked over. “Didn’t see you pass me,” he commented as he sat down at the opposite corner, tucking one leg under him.

Theo raised his own Personal Frame. “I was already up here when we were summoned.”

Blaise glanced up from his desk at that before crossing out some more words on the parchment in front of him with his quill. In the interim, Draco took in Sarah, one of Blaise’s Branch Technicians in the Administration Unit, with a passing glance. His eyes inevitably travelled to the long wall of glass along one side of the room and the activity beyond. Blaise’s office was identical to his, sitting on the opposite side of the Administration Unit upstairs. He could see his Station downstairs from where he sat and caught sight of Harry and Blue still playing catch with light balls. He rolled his eyes, and angled to face the room, watching a bored looking Theo idly flipping through items on his Frame with his wand instead. Blaise bundled the small pile of paper he’d been looking through, tapping them once on the desk to order them together and handed the stack to Sarah. “Have it ready for tomorrow. Stick around for a second, we may need you here.”

Sarah nodded once, taking the package. “Yes, Sir.” She walked to the long sofa between Draco and Theo, sending them a small smile as she sat.

Draco and Theo focused on Blaise as he went to the block of bookshelves that sat along the wall opposite the sofa. In Draco’s office, the walls were bare as he hardly spent any time there. All his work was downstairs as opposed to Blaise. Instead of books, however, the shelves held box folders in different colours, each one pertaining to a Department in the Ministry. There was an identical, though more extensive, version of the shelves outside on Blaise’s main floor. His Unit used them to monitor all of the Ministry’s Departments closely, filing away any correspondence, reports, or miscellaneous documents that could affect their work. Whenever new documents appeared, the boxes glowed with a soft light and his Branch Technicians combed through them sorting it all by importance. Most of it was archived, or sent to the other Units, if needed, but anything that needed immediate action was sent to Blaise’s shelves directly. Draco wondered what would need all the Unit Heads together for a meeting.

Draco watched Blaise head to the series of navy blue box files closest to him and raised his eyebrows. Those were set specially for correspondence from the Minister. Now he understood why Sarah was still in the room. This was obviously important. Sarah was Blaise’s version of Draco’s M-Tech Charles. Theo had one too, Gemma, down in the Research Unit. Theo was a mess whenever Gemma took leave, and Draco knew he couldn’t function without Charles there, so Sarah being present meant that something was happening.

Blaise took out a slim, bright red folder, showing exactly how urgent this was.

“ _Shit_ , what the hell happened?” Theo said, finally putting the Frame down in alarm and paying strict attention. By now they were all fully trained in the art of Blaise’s system.

“Abram Kuznetsov is now wanted by Muggle British, Wizarding British and Wizarding French authorities for smuggling, weapons trafficking and as a suspect for a terrorist act,” Blaise said and sat down. He pulled out his wand, replicating the folder twice with a _Geminio_ and stopping the replications with a simple _Finite_. He sent the folders across to his colleagues when he was done. “Kingsley just got word from France an hour ago.”

Draco caught his folder and opened it up before he’d even brought it to his lap. Theo was the one to speak, though. “Fuck me. _Allée Vertic_? That was _Him_?”

Last year, in order to raise money for the Children’s Orphanage Relief Fund in France, their Ministry officials held a Charity Marathon on the _Allée Vertic_ , the French equivalent to _Diagon_ and _Horizont Alley_ in England, inviting all athletes who wanted to take part in the run. Quidditch Players, Tri-Wizard Tournament Champions, and Broom-Racers from around the world turned up. Even the accidental celebrity, Jim Hamilton, the newest Squib on the Scottish Rugby team came, sponsored by the Wizarding Supporters of Scottish Rugby Union.

The _Allée_ , being the longest Wizarding shopping alley in Europe, was lined with hundreds of supporters and fans. The event was to be the first in a series to support different charities that needed funds after the war. When the explosion happened in _Le Place en Pierre_ , the square that sat in the middle of the _Allée_ , it encased everything in a large cloud of dust. Quite a few of the runners were present, as well as the majority of the spectators, leading the Aurors to believe that the explosion was triggered in person. Even worse, all the people affected by the dust had lost their magic for months, some still hadn’t recovered. The French Ministry had denied help from anyone, claiming they could use the evidence gathered themselves to catch whomever thought they could spoil such a momentous occasion. Since then no one had been arrested. People were calling for blood according to the news on the radio.

Theo turned a page and sat up from his slouch on the sofa. “They’re sending us their evidence?” he said, his voice carrying an edge of excitement. He picked up his Frame and sent a message, likely to Gemma.

Blaise nodded. “Kingsley wants us to go over it, see if we can identify anything. They’ve never seen anything like the spell that was used. All they can tell is the dust is directly involved in the loss of their magic. The people who lost their magic, were all at the epicentre of the explosion or close enough to breathe it in.”

“Shit,” Draco said. “And why is Kuznetsov linked to this?”

“It's the resistance to magic, right?” Theo said. “They think he sold the bomb? Or triggered it himself?”

Blaise leaned back in his chair. “We don’t know yet. But after we informed Kingsley that the man was creating man-made Nulls in Europe, he also got the request from Minister Bergier for help in the investigation.”

Draco looked doubtful. “Help from who? Not us,” he said.

Blaise shook his head. “He just asked for help. Kingsley decided we were better equipped to investigate.” He ignored Draco’s cocked eyebrow. “The samples and notes will be here in an hour.”

Theo stood up, reading the message Gemma sent him. “Let me know when the evidence arrives. Gemma’s using all capitals, which means we’re clearing out the lab. I’ll be downstairs.”

Draco got up too. “Potter may come down later. Give him something to do, would you? He’s driving me mad.”

Theo cocked his head to the side. “He talk to anyone yet?”

Draco shook his head. “He’s dealing with it on his own.”

“Should I book a Mindhealer?” Blaise asked, gaze switching between the two.

Theo gave him a considering look and turned to Draco. “Not a bad idea.”

Draco sighed. “Can you get one on retainer?” he asked Blaise.

Blaise steepled his fingers. “I could, but the rate we’re going with two traumatised operatives, one of which has semi-permanent Signature damage and the other fielding Spontaneous Wild Magic Eruption, we should probably just look into hiring a team.” He looked at Sarah, who was reading through the document he’d given her earlier and making her own notes in the margin. “Sarah, can you take a look through the Ministry’s Personal Files in the Department of Medicine and Healthcare? Compile a list of potentials.”

“Even if they’re straight out of school?” she asked. He nodded. Sarah stood up, holding the stack of papers in one arm. “Yes, Sir,” she said and left the room.

Once the door closed, Draco looked at his friends and colleagues. “You know, sometimes I almost wish we were back at the beginning, in our cupboard, eating takeout and messing around.”

Theo snorted. “You mean when you were in and out of the hospital and we were worried sick you would die every week?”

Draco rolled his eyes and huffed. “Never gonna let me live that down are you?”

Blaise laughed. “Well, some good came out of it. You made Potter a friend.” He gestured out to the floor below where Harry was sitting at Draco’s Central Station playing with Blue.

“Oh, don’t even get me started.”

“It is weird, though, how Blue keeps following him around,” Theo commented. “I mean - obviously Blue isn’t abandoning you,” he said gesturing to the glow of blue light, etched in a grid-like pattern, that always surrounded Draco’s steps on the ground. To this day it followed wherever he went in the Department. “But there are obviously things about Blue that we don’t know yet, and probably should.”

Draco’s intrigued look turned deadpan. “I’m not letting you study me, Theo,” he said for perhaps the millionth time since his first SME, when Blue was made. “Or Blue.”

Theo held up his hands to show he came in peace. “Just saying. We haven’t come across another proper - and sane - wandless caster until Potter. There may be a reason why Blue is so drawn to him.” He shrugged. “Oh well. I have a Unit to prep.”

“I’ll come with you, then. I have a prototype to test.”

Theo grinned, knowing which one Draco was talking about. “You don’t want Potter near it yet?” Both of them gave a departing wave to Blaise, who shooed them out with his hand and sat back at his desk.

Draco rolled his eyes heavenward as he shut the door. “Merlin, no. Aside from an exploding quill, this may be the only thing he constantly asks for. I’m not giving him the satisfaction until it’s ready.” They walked down the stairs to the Ops floor, eyes casting across to Harry and Blue who were still playing around with light balls. A couple of the M-Techs passed the unlikely pair, smiling fondly.

Theo thought of the rucksack sitting at one of his Branch Technician’s Stations. “You don’t think the exploding quill would have been easier?”

“Of course,” Draco said eyes sliding away from Harry to walk down the stairs to R&D. “But when have I ever done anything the easy way?”

Hours later, when Draco came back, Blue and Harry were still at his Station. Harry was talking to Charles, who was going through some specifications to the new wand holster he was outfitting on Harry’s right arm. Blue was moving around while Harry swirled a finger in the air copying his movements. “...really not certain how he’ll handle it, you know?” Harry was saying. “He flies off the handle at the smallest things. Don’t know how Hermione deals with it sometimes. It would be different if he was an Operative too, then I wouldn’t have to lie, yeah?” Like the professional M-Tech Draco had hired, Charles said nothing in response and simply pressed something on the Small Frame when he was done with his measurements. He gestured to Harry, who apparently understood him because he took his wand and placed it in the holster. The holster disappeared as it activated. Harry stretched out his arm, turning it left then right, and nodded. Charles left him, stepping off the dias where Draco’s Central Station was on the main floor and nodded at Draco as he passed with a quiet, “Sir.”

At Draco’s Station, Harry crossed his arms on the desk and rested his chin there, eyes crossing when Blue moved closer to touch his nose. From where he stood, Draco saw Blue use the tip of his translucent mass to push Harry’s glasses up his nose. “Don’t suppose you know of a way, Blue? Think you can convince Draco for me?” Blue rose up, the tip of him bending over to give the impression he was looking at something. Harry raised his head and turned to see what he was ‘looking’ at.

Draco crossed his arms over his chest and watched the both of them. “I am not employing your friends.” He turned and walked towards the surveillance M-Tech Station.

Harry turned back to Blue. “Could’ve warned me he was there, Blue.” The part of Blue that was bent over tilted like it was cocking its head to the side. “Just - give me a sign next time, okay?” he winked and got up to go downstairs. Time to test some Trackers.

“I was wondering,” Harry asked the next day, staring at the ceiling in Draco’s office, as Draco worked at his desk, “Do you ever go anywhere besides your office and your home?” He hadn’t noticed Draco go anywhere, but Draco had a life before he came along.

“No.”

Harry turned to Draco, legs hanging off the arm of the sofa in Draco’s office. “No?”

Draco looked up from the lab results Theo had written out for him so far and cocked an eyebrow in Harry’s direction. “No, Potter,” he repeated. “As in, the opposite of yes.”

Harry rolled his eyes and sat up. He was confused. “So you don’t...” he trailed, not sure how to word his question. _’Go out on the town?’ No. ‘Hang out with friends?’_

Draco sighed, realising that Harry wouldn’t stop. “Don’t what?”

“Like... go out on dates?” he finished lamely.

Now both Draco’s eyebrows rose in surprise. He put down the sheets of parchment in his hand. “We’ve been sleeping together for six months, Harry. You’ve only now noticed we’ve not gone out on a date?”

Harry got up instantly, walking to the visitor’s side of Draco’s desk and sat down, quick to refute that statement. He’d _definitely_ noticed. “No I did, I just - you didn’t seem the type. But I was curious.”

That didn’t seem to make it better. “I didn’t seem the type?” Draco narrowed his eyes. “The type to get to know someone through drinks, food and conversation _before_ I let them in my bed. That type?”

 _Oh dear._ “This conversation is not going how I thought it would.”

Draco propped his head on the heel of his hand and stared. “I should hope not. Because you are a _terrible_ conversationalist otherwise.”

Harry took a deep breath, started from the beginning, and kept it simple. “I’m asking you out on a date.”

Draco stared at him a little longer. “Fine.” He flipped to the next sheet of parchment, reading through the properties the lab downstairs had been able to identify. “Where? When?”

Harry narrowed his eyes, this time in disbelief. “What - Just like that?”

Draco rolled his eyes. “Simple questions tend to get simple answers, Harry, if you have the balls to ask them. Simply,” he stressed.

Harry didn’t even care, he got the result he wanted. “Er, my place?” Draco paused in thought. “Or your place,” Harry backtracked. “Either’s fine. Baby steps, you know.”

Draco shook his head at the nonsense coming out of Harry’s mouth. “Your place is fine.”

“Okay. Tonight? I’ll make dinner.”

Draco shook his head again. “Tomorrow night.” He used his quill to write a note in the margin. “Tonight you’re bonding with your field partner.”

Harry seemed taken-aback at that. “My - I am?”

“Yes. Your next mission is a stakeout for a possible obstruction of an arms deal.” His M-Techs were monitoring all of Kuznetsov’s movements in Bulgaria, and Poland. He was loading trucks in some of the footage, the Muggle emblems on the side demarking a company that rented to individuals looking to transport goods. The license plates were registered and logged and two of them matched what the Ops Unit recorded in their surveillance. “You’ll be going out alone for the first time with Six for what could be a considerable amount of time.” He got up to search in the filing cabinet next to him, pulling out a drawer and sifting through the folders with his fingers and missing Harry’s prideful smile.

Since their training began, Harry had begun calling all the Department Operatives by their numbers, in the order they were hired, like a codename. It was mainly because it was easier (and because Harry was determined to turn the whole Department into an Ian Fleming novel since he found out he was the seventh operative hired). The operatives were all for it, especially in field-practice exercises. He hadn’t yet convinced Draco to go by ‘Q’, nor Theo to go by ‘R’. Blaise did like the moniker ‘A’ for administration, though, so there was that. When the operatives were together in the Department, they insisted on using the numbers more, correcting people and sometimes refusing to answer unless their numbers were used. After months of this, people finally acquiesced, fed up of having to repeat themselves.

Harry smiled some more at the memory, feeling a thrill of accomplishment when even Draco complied. He tried to get Draco to officially change the names of the operatives so that they could be designated with two zeros before their numbers, but so far Draco wasn’t biting. He was getting there, though. They used to be called solely by their surnames before. Although there was no logic behind giving them two zeros for no reason, Draco admitted that shortening their code names to just a number made things easier, especially in the field when they spoke through the Communication Charm in their Personal Frames. Harry seemed to be Draco’s only exception, the name ‘Potter’ so ingrained it was hard to switch. “So no Unspeakables this time?” Harry questioned.

“Nope,” Draco said flicking through a file and using his finger to run down a list.

Harry angled his head to see Draco's expression, a sly grin curving his mouth. “Wow, could you be any happier?”

Shutting the file, Draco looked up and rolled his eyes. “I am no happier than I ever am, Potter.” He shut the filing cabinet and walked off.

Harry scrambled himself up and followed him. “You’re practically giddy.” They descended the stairs to the Ops floor and stepped up on the dias that housed Draco’s Station.

Draco narrowed his eyes at him, taking the figurine Harry picked up from his desk away from him as soon as they stopped at his Station. He put it back down on the desk. “ _You_ wanted to have Operative driven field-missions. _You_ asked for them to have more autonomy and they’ve been training with you to be field agents for three months. And they’ve been doing so well, that four of them are currently handling minor missions in the British Government. I need working field agents for this mission. Five is on medical leave after his regrettable loan to the Unspeakables, of which I _am_ in continuous negotiations with Kingsley, so you and Six are my only operatives available.” He slapped Harry’s hand away when he went to pick up the figurine again. “ _Go and bond with your field partner, Potter_. That’s an order. He’s downstairs with Theo.”

Harry backed away smiling, recognising the stage of frustration he’d pushed Draco into. “Alright, Boss.” He spun and aimed himself towards the entrance to Research and Development and went down the stairs until he came to the opened, metal, riveted door.

Before he went in, Harry took a moment and then walked inside.

It never got old, walking into this... haven.

The CMI, as a whole, was amazing. The Administration Unit worked with an efficiency that bordered on military. The Ops floor flowed with the harmony of a well-oiled machine. Harry never had a chance to lag in his reports on missions, because the Techs from Admin and R&D would have already stalked him down by his arrival at Medical. They’d just appear out of nowhere for him to dictate the aspects of the mission. All of them would be primed with questions aimed to identify the main points of his debrief pertaining to their Unit. Harry was sure that by the time he made his way to R&D to return any equipment, an account of how much his mission cost in damages and requisitions would already be drafted and ready for mailing to accounting upstairs.

But then he’d get to return the equipment. Not _have to_. Get to.

Harry loved the CMI. Really. He respected the Admin floor (he learnt early on in his career that _nothing_ got done if you pissed off the admin). He loved the Ops floor - _lived_ on the Ops floor most days, especially recently. But Research and Development... it made him dizzy sometimes. The open plan of the main floor could make his head spin. As he entered, the floor was filled with Branch Technician Stations (they were actually called R-Techs down here) each Station holding four technicians, two a side. In the middle of every Station, a Frame lit their surfaces. They showed the R-Techs a virtual diagram of what they were working on. To the far end of the room, on the left, held a library. It took up near a quarter of the floor and, to the right, a potions laboratory doubled as Forensics.

And that was just the main floor. There was a sub-level floor that housed a gym, the tactical range, Medbay and a bloody _pool_.

As soon as he cleared the door, Harry stuck to his ritual and turned left to greet Theo and see what was new in the Unit. Theo wasn’t there, but there was plenty to keep Harry occupied. Theo’s Central Station spanned the whole of the left wall from the riveted door entrance to the library. The standard Department Frames littered it, curving with the wall and outlining everything within the Unit, as well as the Department. He bypassed the Frames outlining the Medical Bay and Administration Comm., as well as the Potions Lab. None of those interested him at present. The R-Tech Station messages were always funny, especially if someone managed to blow something up that day, but he wasn’t interested in those either.

The three Frames in the corner closest to the library were always what Harry visited first. Theo’s Mainframe, the Tactical Range and the Ops Communication Frames held the ambrosia of the gods are far as Harry was concerned. Theo was constantly kept up-to-date on the status of new equipment in his Mainframe. The Tactical Range always showed the next piece of equipment in line for testing if there wasn’t an exercise going on, and the Ops Comm. usually outlined what the operatives were being outfitted with in their next mission. If there was anything there, it would be ready and packaged at the Transfer Station on the other side of the floor, which - as Harry leaned back to glance around the translucent Frames in the way - yep there were a number of things over there. There was an especially large rucksack that was near making him salivate. Draco had been working on it for months, but whenever Harry asked about it, the blond expertly deflected Harry’s attention. Every time. That rucksack had passed from development to Mission-Ready without any testing from the other operatives. He’d asked. And he was desperately curious. Harry rubbed his hands together.

“What are you doing down here?” Harry heard and stopped to turn to Theo, who was just coming out of the library. He sent a look to the Prep and Transfer Station. Dammit. It would have to wait now.

“Draco sent me to bond with Six.”

Theo’s eyebrows quirked in amusement. “You don’t seem very happy about that.”

Harry shrugged. Whatever. “No, it’s fine. Is he downstairs?”

Theo swung around and swiped at the Tactical Range Frame with his wand. “He was with Five in the gym last I saw.” The Frame centred on the pool before he swiped again. “Yep, still there,” he confirmed, watching Owen sparring with Robert in the Gym. Harry nodded, sent one last mournful look across the main floor and made his way to the stairs between the Library and the Potions Lab.

Harry could hear Robert’s laughter as he descended the stairs and bypassed the Medbay on his left. He wasn’t looking to return there any time soon. There was a thump as if someone had hit the thick mats that lined sections of the ground in the gym. Harry turned the corner after the pool to see Robert holding Owen Cauldwell, Operative Six and his mission partner, down to a mat with just a twist of his arm.

“I’m telling you,” Robert was saying in passing conversation, “you should lose your magic, mate, really makes you appreciate the small things in life. Like pinning a full powered secret agent to the floor in less than three moves. You owe me three galleons by the way.” Robert looked up and grinned. “Seven! I’m schooling Six on how not to underestimate your target. Once we’re done, we’re gonna go for a rummage upstairs.” He let Owen go and stepped back so he could collapse on his back on the mat.

Owen looked up at Harry and sent him a conspiratory grin. “Hey, did you see the big mystery rucksack on the Transfer Station?”

Harry smiled and took off his shoes, leaving them by the entrance. Time to bond.

Harry stirred the sauce for his spaghetti in his only saucepan one night later as Draco stood nearby drinking a glass of wine. The recipe was Ron’s, taught to him by his mother and passed across to Harry years ago because Harry needed to survive on more than toast and juice. The dish was the easiest thing Ron had, among the four recipes Harry received that evening, in his recipe box for Harry to replicate. Harry had laughed at the fact Ron had a recipe box, but Ron had threatened to take back the recipe card and Harry had replaced the laughter with heartfelt desperate apologies. He tasted it. _Hmm, where’s my black pepper?_ He rummaged in his pantry as Draco kept talking.

“Why do you think I always send you on the missions that primarily deal with Muggles?”

They’d been talking about the operatives. As their trainer, Harry had suggested training them with some Muggle studies since the majority of them grew up in Pureblood homes and didn’t know the first thing about Muggles except for Operative One, Two and Three. They were currently undercover working for the British Government to keep an eye out until the paintings that Harlow Madley stole could be recovered or replaced. The government officials they were assigned to knew of their placement and that it was temporary. It’s how they were able to come in for training when Harry gave them some notice ahead of time.

Draco made the argument that with what the other three knew, and Harry himself, who was more of an asset to their Muggle missions anyway (as everyone and their mother knew his face in the Wizarding World), they didn’t need training in that area. Harry paused in his perusal. “I hadn’t actually noticed.” He pulled an unfamiliar glass bottle off the shelf. _When did I ever use Dill Seed?_ he thought to himself as he stared strangely at the broken seal on the bottle. He put it back and picked up the black pepper. When he turned around, Draco was staring at him.

“It’s because you’re famous, Harry,” he said obviously.

Harry, suddenly, had a flashback to Hagrid telling him ‘ _You’re a Wizard, Harry_ ’ and shook the thought away. “I’m not that famous. Not anymore.” Voldemort fell when he was seventeen.

Draco’s eyebrows shot to his forehead. “Oh... wow. For real? Okay.” He put down his wineglass. “Harry,” he began patiently. “I know you live in your own bubble where you only know your friends and your coworkers, but people tell your story to their children like a fairytale or a fable. It only got worse, not better, when you actually killed the Dark Lord.” Draco gestured to the darkness of Surrey outside. “And that’s just England!” He leaned back against the counter and cocked his head to the side. “You should not have achieved this level of delusion so late in your life. It’s not healthy and only proves that your friends are not doing their job.” At the mention of his friends, Harry turned back to the pot to stir in the black pepper he’d been shaking. “And there’s that face again.”

“What face?” Harry asked, still not looking up.

Draco leaned a hip on the counter next to the stove, where Harry was performing some champion stirring. “The face you’ve been making on and off since you started working for me, that increased in frequency since last week.” When Harry finally turned, a caught out look on his face, Draco rolled his eyes. “I’m not blind, Harry.” He sighed when Harry began avoiding his eyes again.

Harry could only check so many things before he realised that the silence was stretching on too long and looked up to see Draco staring into space.

“Just making a mental note to have Blaise schedule you a psych eval with a Mindhealer,” Draco said when he noticed Harry looking at him. “Since you won’t talk to me,” he stressed.

Harry hooked the wooden spoon in the loop of the saucepan handle to hang over the sauce and let it simmer on low. He covered his face with his hands and ran them down towards his jaw, before cupping them around his neck to rest there. His head dipped as he turned around to lean on the other side of the stove. He stared at Draco’s jumper, dark emerald and arbitrarily folded on the island, through his eyelashes. The blond had taken it off when he came in and tossed it there almost immediately. Ron’s robe had been there just last week before the redhead had left without preamble, leaving the ball in Harry’s court. A ball he couldn’t lob back.

Draco approached Harry carefully. He’d meant the comment about the Mindhealer as a joke, but... Harry wasn’t arguing with him. “Do you want me to stay?”

Harry looked up, his green eyes startling in the light of the kitchen. “Is - can you do that?”

Draco frowned, caught out at the emotion behind the question. “Can I-” He paused. He’d been planning on staying anyway, but thought he’d check. “I haven’t before. It’ll be strange waking up with my magic around me I guess, but - you thought I’d eat and run? That would be a shitty thing to do. I thought that’s why you asked me here.”

“You thought I asked you to dinner, so you could spend the night?”

Draco cocked an eyebrow and leaned back against the island counter across from him. “No, I thought you asked me to dinner to _pre-empt_ having to ask me to spend the night.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “We spend a lot of time at my home, I get it. I can understand why you’d be reticent to ask, but I wouldn’t have said no, Harry.” He sighed, moving closer and tentatively snaked an arm around Harry’s waist. He easily leaned in to rest against the brunet, effectively pinning Harry to the counter’s edge. “I live in a Null for my own protection, sure - I don’t socialise because all the people I socialise with are in my office. We work hard, but we have a lot of fun together, too. I’ve never needed anything else, so I never did anything else. Doesn’t mean I can’t have anything else. I’d have gone outside with you, too, if you wanted.”

Harry took in a deep breath and - almost unconsciously it seemed - wrapped his arms around Draco’s shoulders, pulling him in. “I feel,” he began on his exhale, “- It’s like we skipped this part.”

Draco raised his head from where Harry’d placed it on his shoulder. “The getting to know each other part? Harry, we’ve known each other since we were eleven.”

Harry rolled his eyes. “Yeah and we hated each other until we were seventeen.”

Draco made a doubtful face. “Mmm, eighteen.”

Harry’s brows quirked. “What?”

“Yeah, no I definitely remember cursing your name a few times til my eighteenth,” Harry heard.

He pulled back a smidge, looking Draco in the eye. “Why? What happened?”

Draco pretended to think about it hard. “Got a good job, stopped blaming you for the majority of my woes,” he listed. “Became successful, started working with friends. Dated an Unspeakable,” he added and then narrowed his eyes in thought. “Which really puts the concept of hate in perspective, believe it.” He smiled then. “Hired you. And here we are.” He dove back in to the hug.

Harry chuckled having no objections. “Yeah. Here we are.”

Draco detected the subtle sad tone in his words. “What’s wrong? What was all this about?” He didn’t expect an answer, but wanted it known he was there if Harry wanted to talk.

“About?”

That wasn’t exactly denial, and Harry wasn’t pulling away. Okay, so they _were_ talking about this. Draco fortified himself for a possible argument. Shouldn’t be this hard, they’d had lots of practise before. “You’ve spent a long time living, working, and playing around with your magic. It responds to you in a way... I’ve never seen before. You’ve also spent nights by me, voluntarily, coming back to the Wizarding World every day, a couple hours later. You’ve never had a problem with it, to my knowledge.” He braced for impact. “And you just spent three days, involuntarily, separated from your magic thinking you were going to die.”

Harry pulled away, his arms crossing over his chest. “I didn’t-”

“-You did.” Draco let him pull back but didn’t separate completely, placing his hands either side of Harry on the counter. “I was by your bedside in Medbay. You talk in your sleep when you’re distressed.” He angled his head to maintain eye contact when Harry turned his head to break it. “I don’t blame you, Harry,” he stressed, like he was talking over the thoughts relaying back and forth in Harry’s mind. “It was a distressing experience. I choose to live in an area where magic can’t get to me, because the people who want me dead rely on it to a degree that they won’t know how to use anything else to harm me. It was a strategic choice, end of. You choose to follow me there for my own sake, so I feel safe and because - a few months ago - you discovered that entering a Null gave you a break from having to rein in control of your magic all the time. But now, I believe just the thought of you separating from it again makes you ill. Am I getting warm?” He could see from the look in Harry’s eyes that he was.

The expression of wonder, of being found out, was plain across Harry’s face. “How did you know?”

Draco gave him an obvious look. “You asked me on a date,” he started with. “And your first suggestion wasn’t going out, it was staying home. To cook-” He picked up the recipe card Harry had hidden behind the toaster “-a recipe written in Weasley’s handwriting.” He put it down and looked at the blossoming red blush spreading across Harry’s cheeks and down his neck. “We do this nearly every night. The Department has a low-key pool going on when we’ll move in together.” He brushed a lock of hair off Harry’s forehead, absently tracing the fading scar there. “You’re trying to convince me that spending time with you in your home is a good idea. That’s how I know you’re not okay. Plus, it’s kind of my fault that you believed I didn’t want to in the first place.” He sighed, exhaling through his nose. “I also know this isn’t the only thing you’re upset about. But we don’t have to talk if you don’t want to.” He reached up into the cupboard next to Harry’s head and took down two plates. “Actually, let’s eat. That recipe looked good.”

Harry smiled, letting his arms drop as he chuckled and took the two plates from Draco’s hands. The meal wasn’t bad. He knew that if Ron were there, he’d have some critiques on some of the herbs he’d used. Draco didn’t seem to care if the comments he made while he ate was anything to go by. Harry had confiscated the recipe twice by the time they were washing dishes after the meal.

“I mean, is Weasley sure he shouldn’t be running a restaurant or something? How has no one mentioned this to him before?” Draco questioned, back in his spot at the counter.

Harry dried the last plate and handed it to him, smiling as he watched the blond place it back in the cupboard. “I don’t know. Ron’s not really into cooking for money. He prefers doing it as a hobby. Got to say I kind of prefer it, too. Keeps my fridge stocked.” His smile faded a little. “At least... it did.” Ron hadn’t been coming by as often, what with Harry taking time off and disappearing off the face of the earth. Harry coming home to Ron on his sofa was the first he’d seen of him in ages since Harry first began ‘consulting’ with the CMI last year.

Touching his fingers to Harry’s jaw in understanding, Draco set his forehead against Harry’s, sliding his fingers into the short, soft hair at his nape, kissing him softly. He brushed his tongue against Harry’s lips, hearing him sigh softly before his mouth opened to him allowing Draco access. Draco traced the line of Harry’s teeth, his hands tightening on Harry’s hip and in his hair. He moved closer, pressing him back against the counter again, the bump of contact with the surface seemed to jar Harry out of his stupor.

Harry pulled back slightly, breaking the kiss to breathe. It never ceased to amaze him, how Draco could fill his senses so easily without even trying. The kiss was meant as a distraction, and it certainly worked. But he could see the island counter behind Draco and the crystal clear memory of Ron picking up his robe and leaving was burning behind his eyelids. He buried his face into the space between Draco’s neck and shoulder. “We’re still in the kitchen,” he said.

“I know.” He said it like the mere thought disconcerted him. Harry could feel more than hear the words Draco spoke through the vibrations in his throat. He smiled at the hands questing up from the hem of his jumper, the chill of them mapping his spine. “But I’m _starving_.” Draco bit at the side of his neck making Harry burst into laughter.

Harry pulled back, still laughing as he fixed his glasses back into place. He grabbed one of Draco’s hands. “Come on,” he said and tugged him out of the kitchen to the living room.

Draco grabbed his refilled glass of wine from the island counter as they passed it. “Dammit,” he said as Harry pulled him down to sit on the sofa, “you’re all melancholy again.”

Harry tried to smile, but he knew Draco could see the sadness there. “C’mere.” He watched Draco put down his wine glass on the coffee table. He got closer and pushed Harry back before lying down with him. Harry stared over Draco’s head on his chest and at the blacked out television. “You remember, after Madley, Blaise put me down for sick leave to ‘recover’ and then a leave of absence so I could ‘learn how to control my magic better’ but really transition from the DMLE to the CMI?” Draco nodded against him. The meeting preceding that decision had comprised of Blaise ranting about how Harry Bloody Potter was ‘Auror Personified’ and no one would believe he’d just quit and disappear, especially after the mess their fight made in the middle of DMLE headquarters. So, officially, he’d scheduled the leave to include some training to learn how to use his significant wandless abilities.

And the only place to have done that was a _‘Compound strategically placed in America for Wizards and Witches with Extraordinary Abilities._ ’

It didn’t exist. Of course it didn’t exist. The only downside Blaise identified was that Harry’s friends would see through the bullshit. “Well, the leave of absence Blaise put me down for lifted. My resignation went through.”

Draco nodded slowly, finally understanding. “Ah.” He tightened his hold. Harry appreciated it. “Weasley found out.” Draco raised his head to look at him thinking about the recipe card. “You feel guilty.”

Harry rested his forehead against Draco’s temple. “I don’t like lying to my friends.”

“I’m sorry,” Draco murmured. “I don’t know how you feel,” he said quietly. “I don’t know how to make you feel better.” He burrowed down, into the warmth of Harry’s side.

Harry shook his head minutely, tightening his hold minutely. “It’s okay,” he said. “This - what you’re doing now, this is okay. I’ll work through it.”

“You don’t want to lose them, though. And you might.”

Harry stared at Draco’s wineglass on the table for a moment, wishing he’d brought his with him. “Yeah,” he said softly. “I think I will. Ron came over a couple days ago. Near tore me apart trying to keep this in.” He sniffled.

Draco’s hands came up either side of Harry’s head. “I’m sorry.” He kissed him softly, murmuring platitudes as Harry responded. There wasn’t anything Draco could do. The policy of secrecy was ironclad in Wizengamot Law. Unless you worked for the Department, you couldn’t know about the Department. Even the Unspeakables had to obey the Law as, technically, both they and the CMI fell under the Department of Mysteries’ statute of the Ministry. He began playing with the hem of Harry’s jumper. This was so out of his element. “What can I do?”

“I don’t really think there is anything you _can_ do. I’ll have to make a choice eventually. I’m just lagging on it because I don’t want to make it.” Harry sighed. “Don’t want to admit what I’d rather choose.” He covered his face with his hands. Sixteen years of tried, tested and successful friendship, versus six months of what he’d discovered with Draco and all the trappings that came with him. “I feel like I’m a terrible person.”

Draco manoeuvred himself to sit up and face him, resting on his stomach where he straddled him on the sofa. “You’re not.” He pulled Harry’s hands away from his face, trapping them and placing them in his lap and leaning back against Harry’s knees. “Harry, you’re not. I promise you’re not. I know terrible people. You don’t qualify.” Harry laughed.

They stared at each other then. Harry sniffled and looked down and the jumble of their hands. “Doesn’t stop me feeling like shit though.” He tugged on Draco’s hands, pulling the blond toward him. He wrapped his arms around Draco’s shoulders as he made space for him to lie down. “But thanks anyway.”

Harry woke with a shock, eyes opening wide to his bedroom ceiling. Next to him, Draco murmured in his sleep and turned over. Harry focused on breathing so he wouldn’t wake him up in his panic. Realising he wouldn’t be able to relax laying there in the dark, Harry got up, quickly donned a pair of boxers and his terry cloth dressing gown - grabbing it off the back of his bedroom door - and left the room. He was glad his heating was still on. He always had to set it the Muggle way, because experience taught him that any heating spells he performed could go awry during sleep. He switched on the lights as he walked, feeling an itch under his skin as he entered the kitchen. He rounded the island and lit the hob under the kettle, shaking it to make sure it had water. Listening to the sound of the fire burning through the gas, Harry leaned back against the island with a sigh.

His hands were still trembling. He balled them into fists and rested them atop the counter, knuckles down, on either side of him and focused on breathing deep and calm. The silence in the kitchen was only broken by the hiss of the gas stove burner.

This wouldn’t do.

Living through it was one thing, nightmares about being abandoned... he thought he’d got over those when he was twelve. This new trauma just seemed to dig it all up again. Draco was right earlier. Lying alone, in the five degree celsius cold, where no one could find him had taken a toll. The chill of the memory made him tense, the ricochet of the shiver down his spine made his muscles ache. He thought having Draco with him would quell the nightmares. He’d have to think of something else. Draco may have been joking earlier, but if this kept happening, he may need to talk to someone before it affected his work.

For now though, his magic was humming like a bass vibration. If he focused a little more, he could almost feel it over-protectively enfolding him like a heavy cloak. He shut his eyes as he reached up into a cupboard to get a cup for his tea, feeling the familiar build up as he sent it out in his home, his domain. He could feel Draco asleep upstairs, his magic cool and azure as it spread out around his bedroom. The ultramarine of it reminded him fiercely of Blue. His colour dominated the Ops floor at work as he sped from one place to another, highlighted Draco’s space wherever he walked, or popped up out of nowhere to play with Harry. He smiled at the memory of his new friend, opening his eyes, and nearly dropped the cup he’d blindly selected.

Blue was on his kitchen counter.

For a long moment, Harry just stared, convinced he was seeing things. Slowly, he put the cup down, hesitating momentarily when Blue naturally moved out of the way to make room for him to place it on the counter. Harry shut his eyes again, shook his head and opened them.

This time Blue did his uncanny approximation of a head cocked to the side, his usual ultramarine colour going deeper to make him purple.

“I think I’m hallucinating, I need to sit down,” Harry said to himself. He dragged a stool over from the side of the island and dropped himself upon it, jumping when Blue sank into his kitchen counter next to his stove and then rose up again on his island. The kitchen was silent after that. “Okay,” Harry said gearing himself up for a minor breakdown. “How are you here? Did you follow Draco here? I thought you couldn’t leave the Ministry?”

Blue, of course, didn’t answer. Harry wasn’t surprised. He’d tried talking to Draco’s magic before, but other than copying his movements, he hadn’t got anywhere. He knew Blue could understand him, though. He’d asked for random things around the Department once, just to see if Blue would get them. Draco had put a stop to it when he noticed his office and his Central Station was suddenly filled with random nonsense. Harry switched off the kettle when it started to whistle, but didn’t make his tea yet. He instead sat back down and propped up his head with the heel of his right hand. The other he used to poke Blue in the side. “So what are you doing here? Draco’s asleep, which you probably know.”

Harry leaned back a little, his hands gripping the edge of the counter when Blue suddenly pushed something out of himself. Harry always freaked out a little when he saw Blue doing that. It made it look like he was regurgitating whatever it was and, though Harry knew logically that he only felt that way because he was personifying the mass of manifested magic, he couldn’t help it. It was gross.

He pushed that feeling aside for a moment, though, when he realised Blue had ‘spat out’ one of the six by four Frames from the Department. On it, was a frozen scan with a localised map of- “Is this Surrey?” He lived in Surrey. “Is this how you tracked Draco?” Blue remained silent, but Harry could tell there was more. The purple appearance he’d taken on was brightening into red, his typical transformation whenever he was reacting to Harry’s magic. Pausing, Harry placed the Frame down and looked at the time stamp before glancing up at the clock in the kitchen. The Frame was frozen on roughly ten minutes ago.

When he’d woken up.

Harry stared at the Frame and then looked closer at Blue, feeling the itch under his skin get worse as if triggered by the realisation. He raised his hands in front of his face and turned them over, the bone deep vibration reminding him of landing on a deserted road in Wiltshire half a year ago. “Fuck.” Glancing past his fingers, he saw Blue following the movement. “You weren’t looking for him, were you?” Curious, and taking a chance, Harry placed his hands down on the island’s counter with intent, smiling in satisfaction when Blue jumped on them.

Harry kicked back in his chair next to Owen Cauldwell, sharing a box of mini toffee eclairs from Morgana’s Cafe on Diagon Alley. They’d just finished lunch, and the eclairs were a treat that Owen bought for them to share. In front of them, Robert was being coached through exercises Harry could only describe as Magical Physical Therapy. Aside from their group of four, the Medbay was otherwise empty. No patients meant the current outsourced staff weren’t needed, after all. At the counter, Theo put the potion bag to the side as Robert centred himself and pushed his magic outward toward his hands. Harry had sat with him in the gym to explain what he’d learned about wandless magic in R&D’s extensive library. There was a book of diagrams, theorising upon how magic dispersed itself in the body, how each Witch and Wizard was a conduit for the natural flow of magic, and how often you used it could dictate how well you controlled it.

Another book started with simple exercises that Harry found by an American author named Reba Batoncolle. It was rather comprehensive; the Americans, it seemed, did a lot more research on wandless casters, rare as they were, so a lot of empirical evidence through observation was documented extensively. There were a few interviews too, of casters explaining how they used their hands instead of their wands. This included an exercise to stimulate the core, the area that served as the ‘entry point’ for all magic to ‘flow in’ and _push_ the magic toward the hands instead of relying on a wand to _pull_ the magic out of you.

Harry originally thought it to be ridiculous, but once he started the breathing exercises and the meditation, he found the control over the flow of it got easier. It came in handy, too, especially when he travelled back and forth from Draco’s home. But Harry was a natural wandless caster. His ability to use his magic without a wand had never really gone away, as the first time he got a wand was at eleven. By then the pathways his magic used were already set in place and not malleable like a child showing first signs of a Wild Magic Signature. Robert was different in that he was one of the typical Wizarding children who, when he displayed signs of Wild Magic, was given a training wand to curb the habit and avoid any fatalities. Being a Ravenclaw, Robert opted to experiment on becoming a wandless caster when Theo ‘suggested’ it (typical Slytherin) and Harry, subsequently, wasted no time in showing Robert how to start when he got back from Berlin while they spent some time in the gym. The fact that the potions Theo was administering to him were stimulating a response meant that his magic was _there_ he just couldn’t access it with his wand. The exercises were to help him strengthen the ‘muscles’ that controlled the flow, so to speak so he wouldn’t need the wand anymore. Theo was attempting to reshape the pathways of Robert’s magic. It was a pretty big deal, Slytherins weren’t called ambitious for nothing.

“So, he’s pulling his magic to the surface?” Owen stage whispered, as if commentating on a movie, digging the cream out of the inside of his eclair with his finger.

Harry cocked his head to the side at Owen’s antics. “Apparently.” He licked toffee off his own fingers as he watched Theo counting down. “He’s been practising the exercises I showed him, but I don’t think he’s ever had to do it for Theo before so I’m not sure how well it’ll work.”

“I _can_ hear you,” Robert said, his voice straining as he pushed.

At the count of one, Theo sat back. “Robert-”

“Five,” Robert corrected, grinning at the responding sigh.

Theo glared before he rolled his eyes. “ _Five_ , is showing all the signs of a child just before they are given a training wand.” Theo sat on the stool across from Robert and placed his Personal Frame along Robert’s forearm. “He’s only been at it a week, but we’re trying to see if we can get him to control his Wild Magic from scratch, like you did.” He used his wand to open the scanning charm on the Frame and became focused on it. “Usually in children, the magic manifests with strong emotion and is emitted in bursts like a miniature Spontaneous Wild Magic Eruption, only it’s directed at a purpose rather than a general explosion,” he said to the group.

Harry’s eyebrows rose. “Okay. Well, I can only see two problems with that.” He picked up another eclair. “I was bullied when I was a kid and that’s how my magic manifested most of the time - by running away from bullies while feeling lots of frustration and anger.”

“Oh lovely,” Robert quipped. “ _More_ time with the Unspeakables.” The small group of operatives laughed and Owen tipped the box of eclairs in his direction. Robert picked one up to pop in his mouth.

Theo rolled his eyes. “What’s number two, Sensei?”

Harry snorted in amusement and pointed with his next eclair. “You may want to switch your Frame to his other hand. If you’re gonna see any traces of magic, it’ll be there. He’s left-handed,” Harry elaborated at Theo’s look. Theo looked up at Robert, who shrugged but nodded.

Theo cast his gaze back to Harry, not getting any answers from Robert. “It manifests in the hand you write with?”

Harry shook his head. “Not really. More like it manifests on the side you _lead_ with. Nine times out of ten, that’s your dominant hand. Robert leads with his left a good percent of the time, so his magic will travel there in majority.” Points to him for adult learning. Hermione would be proud. “It’s why we place a righty on his left so they cover each other’s flank.”

“Aw, thanks man,” Robert said holding up an eclair.

Harry grabbed one from the box and knocked it against Robert’s in cheers. “No problem.”

Theo sighed, long-suffering and loud. He watched Owen throw an eclair in the air. “Aren’t you two supposed to be in the gym?”

When he managed to catch it in his mouth, Owen put his hands in the air in celebration. “It’s our cheat day.” Harry and Robert laughed with him.

“Oh my god,” Theo said putting down his Frame. “Bunch of...” he frowned at Harry. “Something wrong with your hand?”

Harry looked down to see himself massaging his hand. He’d been doing it on and off all day. “Meh, bit of an ache. It’s no big deal.” He put his hand down at the Nurse’s Station, not surprised when the cool feel of magic snapped over his hand. Like the weekend before in his kitchen, he experimented in gently pulling his hand back, but Blue wouldn’t let him go.

Owen startled, his chair slamming back to the ground. “Whoa, is that Blue? Why is he red?”

Harry could guess, but he wasn’t ready to share yet. The cool encompassing mass _was_ making his hand feel better. Theo stood up to try and help him pull his hand back. Before Harry could tell him not to bother, Blue let him go. Harry looked down at his hand. The ache was gone. Through his fingers, Harry could see Blue was handing him something, the side of the blue mass rolling back and pushing an object at him. Harry picked it up gingerly - seriously, he’d never get used to it, no matter how many times he saw it - more confused than before.

Owen tilted is head to the side in confusion. “Is that the sign from the corridor?” he commented, reading the Notice Board sign that usually sat over the Notice Frame by the stairs.

“Potter!” Harry jumped, startled at the angry voice. He turned to see Draco walking determinedly toward them.

Robert whistled. “Uh, oh. What did you do?” he said, keeping his arm still so Theo, who’d sat back down, could continue scanning it.

Harry actually thought back. “I haven’t done anything. Not that I recall, anyway.” Not that Draco knew about.

Draco’s arrival hailed on a cloud of anger. “What have you done to Blue? He refuses to listen to me. He’s not coming when I call.” He narrowed his eyes at the little traitor as he gently bobbed close to Harry on the Nurse’s Station.

Harry still hadn’t told Draco about what happened. He wasn’t sure how to put the conversation into words, or how Draco would take the fact that his magic was roaming around England without his permission to track Harry down and soothe his magic build ups. “I haven’t done anything,” Harry repeated, noticing the other two operatives silently edging away. _Traitors._

“I - why is he here then? And why are you holding that sign?” Draco added incredulously.

Sudden recognition filled Harry’s expression. _Could’ve warned me he was there... Give me a sign next time_ , he’d said. He looked at Blue. The want to laugh at the very literal translation Draco’s magic had taken was very strong. “ _Oh_. I get it. But you’ve got to listen to your maker, okay?” he gestured with the sign for emphasis. “He’s your... I dunno, primary objective or whatever.” _Or was that robots?_

Draco crossed his arms over his chest. “Listening to you telling my magic to obey me, is not making me feel better.” He looked around at the other three men watching them. “What is happening here? Aren’t you lot supposed to be training?”

“We’re training Five to use his Wild Magic so we can see if we can make another Seven. Then we can force the Minister to tell us what the Unspeakables did so we can patent it, punish them properly and train the rest of us the same way.” The group turned to look at Owen. “What? Isn’t that what we were doing?” He picked up the box and held it out to Draco. “You want the last eclair?”

Draco stared at Owen, then took in the other two men who were watching Owen in surprise. He took the eclair anyway. “Continue,” he said in suspicion. He turned and walked away. “Potter, give Blue back,” he said over his shoulder as he left. “Last warning.”

“I’m not keeping him, Draco.” At least, he didn’t think he was.

“Meeting at 1430, boys. Got your mission brief.” Draco called saluting with the eclair as he turned the corner to the stairs. Harry was still watching after Draco when there was a flare from the Personal Frame Theo was holding.

“Excellent,” Theo said with satisfaction.

“You got something?” Robert said with no little hope in his tone. Harry understood completely. Being unable to access his magic had been traumatic enough that he was having nightmares about it. Robert still hadn’t told them how he lost his, only that he’d been informed by the Unspeakables’ Healer that the effects were temporary. Harry knew though, that the process of losing it hadn’t been good for him, saw the faraway look Robert got sometimes when he was sitting alone. The sooner they severed their ties with the Unspeakables the better.

Theo grinned and picked up his Personal Frame, spinning in the chair to touch it to the corner of the larger Medbay Frame on the wall behind the Station. Using his wand, he cast a _Simulat_ on it and the operatives watched the colours whorl together and begin to mirror what was on Theo’s Frame for them all to see. Harry looked at what he could only describe as an x-ray film of a left arm. “Your readings from three weeks ago.” Theo moved the picture to one side with the swipe of his wand and brought up another image with the same spell. “Your readings from two minutes ago.” He lined the two up side by side. There was a grey void on the chart to the left, and a faint explosion of colour moving around on the chart to the right, localised along the centre of his arm. Small offshoot branches of colour brightened to white, stretching toward the hand. “Wish I’d taken readings before, when you primarily used your wand,” Theo murmured to himself.

“So what are we looking at?” Robert was focused on the faint, branch-like, burst of colour.

Theo smiled. “That is your Wild Magic in bloom,” he said. “In St Mungo’s, when a child is brought in for an SME, their diagnosis is a lack of control and the parents are asked to get them a training wand. The use of the wand streamlines the magic to the palms where the wand sits.” He smiled and put down his Frame. “We’re not going to do that with you. Instead, we’re going to continue with your breathing exercises and have you become accustomed to the push and pull of your magic before we do any spells. Congratulations. You’re a new breed.” Robert smiled, the sad tinge to it making Theo tut. “Hey. You’ll be able to use it soon. It will just take practise. And Potter will help, won’t you, Potter?”

Harry nodded, not bothering to correct Theo on his designation this time. “Course.” Harry grinned when Robert smiled at him before the man turned back to his scan.

Theo rolled his eyes. “This’ll cheer you up, look at this.” He pushed the two charts to the side and accessed the library archive from upstairs on his frame. He brought up a scan similar to Robert’s but the explosion of colour was much smaller in comparison. It was limited to certain areas, forming an almost uniform stream to the hand. “Before H- _Seven_ here came to us-” He rolled his eyes at their collective grin. “-Draco was looking for a wandless caster and we had to scan them all to make sure they were suitable-” He was abruptly stopped when Harry’s chair slammed to the floor as he sat up straight.

“Please tell me that’s a picture of Unspeakable Lexley’s magic,” Harry interrupted with a grin bordering on maniacal.

Owen’s eyes lit up in child-like excitement. He started hitting Robert’s arm, shaking it when Robert didn’t smile straight away. “Oh, _yes_ , let that be a thing. A thing that we have. Is that a thing that we have?” he pleaded.

Theo rolled his eyes again, but smiled nevertheless, glad he could cheer Robert up a bit. “Oh boys, I have a whole collection of their scans. Interested?”

“Wow, this works better than I thought it would,” Harry heard as the group of three finally made their way upstairs in high spirits. They had fifteen minutes until their meeting on the Ops floor. When they arrived at the Research floor, though, they noticed that the Transfer Station was in the process of being emptied. “Did you change any settings?” Harry turned back to the R-Tech Station to eavesdrop as he followed Owen and Robert through the main floor.

“No. But it is weird. A lot of the projects down here are performing very well, even some of the unstable ones. Which is weird since we usually have at least _one_ explosion before a Tuesday.”

The three operatives walked upstairs to the Operations floor to see a larger flurry of activity. There were M-Techs working furiously at their Stations and a small group laying out equipment being hauled from downstairs on a large table.

“Something tells me you guys are leaving soon,” Robert said sipping from the juice he had left over from their take-out for lunch. The three of them looked to the left as an M-Tech walked past them, carrying the huge rucksack that had been top secret in R&D for weeks now. Their eyes followed her to the Equipment Station, curious as to what was in the bag, wondering if they’d finally get to discover it. They’d been thwarted at every attempt so far. She put it on the table and stepped aside as Blue appeared next to it, opened the top, and dove inside.

They paused as a collective, Robert going as far as pausing mid slurp.

“Wanna see?” Owen said.

“Damn straight,” Robert said.

“Hell yeah,” Harry echoed and they all began the journey.

“Oh good, you came upstairs.” They were interrupted in their approach yet again and turned from their attempted perusal of the table with incredulous expressions to see Draco walking over with Charles. “Okay. You’re leaving in an hour. We have CCTV footage of Abram crossing the border into Poland. He’s selling weapons again and British Muggle Intelligence is asking us to take over and get this man before he disappears once more. The French Wizarding Ministry is adamant for his capture, too, because his last arms deal ended with hundreds dead in _Allée Vertic_ last year.”

“That was him?” Harry remembered that. The Aurors from the British Ministry had been called to aid in keeping the peace during the first Charity Run down the French version of Diagon Alley. Harry had been so excited to visit the longest Wizarding shopping Alley in the world and had even thought of taking part to raise money for the children’s orphanage relief fund. He opted out at the last minute though and decided to work security instead. Then the explosion happened and everything turned to chaos. No one found the people responsible and the British Aurors were told they were not needed for the investigation. “How do you know that?” Harry asked.

Draco turned to him. “Samples were taken from the explosion site and brought to us when the French authorities couldn’t make anything of it. We were able to identify all but one element within a compound that is resistant to everything we’ve tried. We weren’t able to identify it until you got trapped two weeks ago in Berlin.” He took the Personal Frame Charles gave him and turned it around so Harry could see. “You had it all over your clothes. It’s exactly the same. We just don’t know what it is, but it’s resistant to magic. _All_ magic.” Draco looked solemn. “If you see anything like it, bring it to me. I want it.” There was a covetous look in his eye. “For science. Of course.” Next to him Blue slunk out of the bag and came to a rest beside Draco’s hand.

Harry watched the both of them and smiled. “Of course.”

Draco rolled his eyes. “So,” he began and cleared his throat. “Standard Tracker and holster. Then there’s this.” He put down a cube, little larger than a regular die. “Holds and prolongs a spell, so it doesn’t wear off until you _Finite_. It will even keep while you’re asleep if you need it overnight.” He turned it around. “Each side can take one spell and they turn green when they’re storing one. Keep it in your pocket to stay out of sight. If it’s removed, you can separate a maximum of two yards. You can overwrite all spells but one. The sound dampener.”

Harry nodded. _So we don’t make when we Apparate._ “Nice.” He chuckled when Draco shook his head at his reaction. “What is this?” He said eyeing the rucksack that had brought them over in the beginning.

Draco gave him a knowing look, his eyes moving past him to the two behind him. He shook his head and picked up a key with a remote on it. The remote had the same four interlocking chrome circles on it to match the bag. After a bit of a dramatic pause, he pressed the button with the red asterisk on it and the bag started to alarm.

Like a _car_.

“Guess,” Draco said switching off the alarm with a beep of the remote.

The three operatives stood up straight, a look of childish delight spreading on their faces. “No-” Harry began his hand covering his mouth.

“-Fucking-” Robert continued.

“-Way.” Owen concluded.

“Hmm,” Draco hummed satisfied at their antics. “State of the art Transfiguration. It’s a Q5, nothing fancy.” He held out the key to Harry, who took it with reverence, tracing the four circles with his thumb. He’d seen the circles before, of course he had, but he hadn’t connected them with the bloody _car brand_. _This bloody Department_ , his mind supplied and then tuned back into what Draco was saying. “No need to park it. Just throw and unlock, make sure you’re out and lock. It does the rest itself. The spell is in the remote, but it uses the magic of the user to power the spell. So Muggle-proof.” He moved on, holding up a rectangular device that reminded Harry of the office Frames all the staff used, but this was smaller. It was also made of metal, making it look like a chrome picture frame with no backing. He looked at Owen. “Activate your Frame and attach it to the dashboard once the car is on. We can communicate through this vocally and through _Flagrate_ messages.” As Owen moved to take it, Draco snatched it back. He gave them a sharp look. “Bring back my car, boys.”

Owen and Harry nodded mutely.

Draco narrowed his eyes at them and nodded once, handing the Frame to Owen. “You’re going to Poland.” He rounded his Station and looked up at his Mainframe. “We picked him up on camera, on the E67, heading east through Babino, then later on the S8 through Łyski. Since he’s got history in this direction, we’re pretty certain he’s heading through Warsaw to Kuźnica so he can enter Belarus. You’re going to set up surveillance tonight and intercept after the Border Guard in Belarus. We’ve got footage there, so we can tell you when his trucks will be passing. Get to them, and scan the weapons he’s carrying with the Frame using an _Enarratio_ charm.” He pointed at the metal Frame in Owen’s hand. “If any of the compounds in the trucks match what we have documented, he’s ours and he can’t get away.” When his operatives had packed everything, Draco nodded. “Go get ready, meet back here at 1530, you can _Apparate_ from Transport upstairs.”

Owen and Robert nodded and left, conversing on the mission. Robert wouldn’t be going, but he could definitely provide support from the Ops floor. Harry rested his elbows on the table, smiling to himself when he felt the cool sensation of Blue pressing up against his elbow. He looked down at him and then up at his maker. Draco was watching him carefully. “Come with me, I need to talk to you.” Harry stood and followed Draco up the stairs to his office overlooking his Department. “Blue, darken the window,” Draco said once he got inside.

Harry would never get tired of watching Blue work. As the Department disappeared behind a newly blacked out window, Harry barely had time to orient himself before Draco was on him. His hand slowly traversed down the length of Draco’s spine, feeling the vertebrae under the thin layers of his shirt and jumper. His hand moulded to the skin so tightly he could feel Draco's shudder echo up his arm. The movement jogged his memory, remembering snug heat and whispered kisses, falling asleep with arms around him and feeling safe, even after having a nightmare. If he _did_ die on this mission, any regret he had, wouldn’t be with this. Never with this.

He wasn’t suicidal enough to say that out loud though. He looked into Draco’s eyes, satisfied at the blown pupils he could see and rested his head on Draco’s shoulder. He shut his own eyes in the process and took a deep breath in.

_Yeah, I’d never regret this._

“You very nearly didn’t come back last time.”

Harry felt the tug of a smile on his mouth. His Slytherin was so predictable. “I’m coming back,” he reassured.

A hand tightened on the back of his jumper. “You better. I’ll be watching you.”

Harry chuckled, breathing his mirth into the heat of the space Draco made for him. “You say the creepiest things, sometimes.” With one last fortifying breath he finally let go and stood up. “I’ve got to get ready.” He kissed Draco once more. “And you’ve got a mission to run. Q,” he added cheekily.

Draco narrowed his eyes at him in annoyance. “1530.” He stayed where he was as Harry circled him to walk to his office door. “Don’t die on me, Operative Seven.” He finally turned to see Harry standing in his doorway.

“Wouldn’t dream of it, Boss.”

“So... stakeouts are boring.”

Harry snorted, tipping his head back on the buttery leather of the driver’s seat. Getting to the border patrol had been the most exciting part of the last couple of hours. Standing on the side of the road, on the M6 in Belarus, around the corner from the Border Guard, Harry and Owen had made sure no one on the deserted road would see them at four in the afternoon. They gripped each other’s arms as Owen threw the bag into the road and Harry pressed the disarm button on the remote.

Fucking Merlin. The CMI was a _miracle_.

No one was around to see them jumping up and down as the bag unfolded over and over on itself to reveal a sleek black Audi Q5 angled oddly on the grass. The transition was soundless, there were no flashes of light and the car was _beautiful_. Harry had run his hands along the pristine metal while Owen walked around it, just staring at it for far too long. They hurried to jump into the car and Harry turned the key in the ignition while Owen activated the Frame, sticking it to the dashboard as quickly as he could. The swirl of magic was instantaneous on the glass as it connected to the magic powering the car.

It swirled around and around, mixing with Owen’s, connecting. Harry put the car in gear, pulling out effortlessly onto the right side of the road. Once the glass settled into one colour, a rich ultraviolet, Owen used his wand to open the communication charm embedded in every Frame ever made. They were instantly met with the irate voice of Draco Malfoy, who scolded them and asked why they took so long to connect.

Once the tirade was over, Harry and Owen looked at each other over the console. “Forgot they drive on the right side here. Had to pull over for a moment,” Harry had said, practically hearing Draco’s eye roll from where he sat.

Now, hours later, they’d managed to find a spot out of the way of the minor amount of traffic passing by and cast a simple _Repello Muggletum_ on the die stuck to the dashboard. They received updates every fifteen minutes. Robert had come on half an hour ago to keep them company when Draco got tired of their eye spy games to pass the time. The backseats were extended with a _Capacious Extremis_ , and Owen was lying down on the bed-like back seats, staring at the ceiling, while Harry kept watch out front.

“ _You expected more for what can only be described as glorified camping?_ ” said Robert through the Frame. Harry had lovingly dubbed it the Car Frame, its sleek silver blending in well with the dashboard.

“Urgh, don’t say camping.” Harry had vowed after the Forest of Dean, to never set foot in a tent again. He even commuted for Quidditch when the World Cup came around. So many awful memories. He looked out the window. It was getting dark now.

“Remind me why we couldn’t just sneak in to the Border Guard?” carried from the back seat.

Harry angled his head toward the space above the middle console. “And if Kuznetsov has activated his anti-magic shielding technology? Do you want to explain to them what we’re doing there, in an unregistered car, with no paperwork or proof of travel? We don’t know what the technology is, or how he’s using it, but we have to assume he’s employed it as a countermeasure here, because he’s used it everywhere else.”

“So what should we do?”

“ _Theo says to use the scanning charm on the Frame. When we’ve positively identified the trucks, you’ll pull up behind. Overtake them one by one, and scan as you pass them. The scanned images will come straight to HQ and you’ll be advised from there_.”

“Great,” Harry said. “And how far off is he?”

There was some shuffling on the other side of the Frame. “ _They’re in the Border Guard right now_ ,” said Theo’s voice. “ _Based on previous surveillance, average time for trucks to pass is about a half hour and there’s four of them. We’ll let you know when they exit. Chances are they’ll wait for each other and travel as a group._ ”

Owen groaned anew from the backseat, and Harry laughed, letting his head drop back onto the headrest.

“ _First truck after the Opal Astra. License plate-_ ” Harry absently listened to the plate numbers as Robert read them out. Knowing Owen was focusing on it more, Harry detached the die Draco had given them. He ended the muggle repelling charm and cast a disillusionment spell instead, fixing it to the dashboard above the Car Frame once again. There was no change from the inside, but Harry saw how the exterior car metal faded to a dull sheen and grinned as he placed the car into first gear. It was nearly ten in the night and he’d begun yawning an hour ago, but he could feel the energy of an impromptu chase stir in his blood. Owen sat up in the passenger seat - where he’d crossed over once Robert alerted them that the trucks were pulling out of the Border Guard led by a Skoda - as Harry prepared to follow them. Lights came around the bend in single file formation and Harry counted the slow moving large vehicles while Owen ticked off their license plates one by one. Once they all passed and were accounted for, Harry ended the charm on the die. He didn’t want anyone coming in the opposite direction to crash into them because they couldn’t see them coming.

He eased onto the road, changing gears to catch up to the final truck in the line. “Just hold it steady as you scan, okay? I’ll do the rest,” Harry said and Owen nodded in agreement.

“ _Good luck you guys,_ ” they heard. “ _We’re going silent now. See you on the other side_.”

“Noted, Five. We’ll let you know.” Harry and Owen shared a look. Harry took a deep breath, looked out for significant space and put on his left indicator.

The Operations Unit was near silent as they waited for the images to come in. Six had already scanned the first truck, noting the license plate as he did. “ _Waiting for confirmation before we take another, Boss._ ”

Draco’s white-knuckled grip on the counter was unrelenting.

“Image coming in, Sir.” Draco turned to the closest M-Tech Station that was receiving the initial scans to label and send to R&D. She nodded. “It’s clear enough for us to analyse. They can continue.”

Draco returned his focus to his Mainframe. “Image confirmed, Six, continue the scans.”

“ _Noted, Boss. Passing the remaining trucks now._ ”

“I can already tell that we’ll be able to arrest him,” Theo said standing next to the M-Tech Station and looking over the results. “Most of these items have the same properties. And.... whoa,” he said with a rush of astonished air. “What is that?”

Draco frowned, finally distracted enough to come over. The second scan was filling the M-Tech Station Frame from left to right as Six scanned it. The image showed the partial content of the second to last truck in the line, which seemed to be filled with nothing but uniform black spaces stacked in bundles. It was almost as if something was blocking the scanning charm from penetrating them.

“Well,” Blaise said coming off the last step that led from the Admin Unit, “if that’s not evidence of a magic resistant property, I’m Merlin’s nephew.”

It was slow going, and there was a small snag when a long line of traffic interrupted their third scan, but the images were coming in, and they were all good enough for analysis. They were finally receiving the third scan in the queue when there was a blaring horn through the communication charm. “Six? Report.”

There was a crunching sound, a squeal of tyres. “ _Fuck!_ ”

Draco felt a chill freeze him in place. That was Harry. “Seven?”

It didn’t sound as if any of the operatives in the car were paying them any attention. They clearly had better things to worry about. “ _Fuck, he’s seen us. Get down, Six. Get - Owen, get the fuck down!_ ” Popping sounds and more squealing tyres.

“Six! Seven, report! What’s happening?!” He turned to his surveillance team near the stairs. “Get me eyes on that road,” he said evenly.

“We’ll do a Track on the Frame, Sir. Operative Six activated it, so we should be able to. The road has no cameras on the M6 until the Belarusneft Petrol Station.” A few long seconds passed, filled with more popping sounds and the blare of a car horn. The M-Tech surveyed the map and the blinking orange dot that began to race along the motorway. “They’re still on the M6, Sir. Just passed through Daylidki.” He whistled. “Wow that’s fast.”

There was a series of horns. “ _Yes I’m aware I’m on the wrong bloody side - move out of the fucking way!_ ” Harry’s voice said in a rush.

“Bring up the Petrol station. We may only see them for a moment, but I want to see them not just a dot on a map.”

“Petrol Station camera ready, Sir. Transfer via _Simulat_ to Frame Five.” The CCTV footage from the Petrol Station came up showing a dark, calm evening lit by the flourescent lights of the building. “Approaching in ten, nine, eight...”

The room followed the dot on the map travelling faster on the M6 towards Belarusneft Gas Station. At ‘two’ a dented and scratched Audi Q5 hurtled past, followed by a single Skoda close to its tail. In the footage, the Audi barely managed to avoid hitting a car exiting. The horn coming through the communication charm on the Mainframe coincided with the image.

“ _Look both ways, goddamn prat!_ ”

“The Frame is giving intermittent signals, Sir.”

Draco turned to the M-Tech who spoke. “What?”

“I don’t think Operative Six put it back on the dashboard when he was done with the scans. There is still one uploading to the Mainframe, but it’s taking a while, likely because Six is so distracted.”

“ _Turn here, get off the highway or he’ll run us off._ ”

There was a crash, the sound of skidding tyres quickly followed, and then the orange dot completely disappeared. “They just turned right off the M6, Sir, heading east towards the P44.” He paused abruptly, a frown marred his expression. “The signal from the Frame is gone.”

 _Fuck._ “Where the hell are they going?”

“Where the hell are we?” Harry asked as he quickly changed gear to go faster.

Owen looked at the sign they were approaching. _Сардэчна запрашаем у Korenevichi_. “My guess? Korenevichi.” Harry snorted at Owen’s reply, shaking his head. He overtook a car, ducking his head when a bullet shattered the back windscreen. The small town passed by in a matter of seconds before the Skoda chasing after them rammed them again from behind.

“Fucking Christ,” Harry exclaimed as he got control of the car again. “I’m beginning to second guess my decision to end the disillusionment spell.”

Owen let out hysterical laughter. “Yeah, that would have been helpful.” He gripped onto the overhead bar above his window. “No point dwelling on the past though.” He looked out the window into the cracked wing mirror and frowned. “He’s coming up on the side,” he commented with worry. “Harry. He’s gonna run us off the road.”

“Not if I do it first,” Harry said ominously, waiting for the Skoda to approach halfway before turning the steering wheel, and the car, off onto a dirt road on the left. The Skoda fishtailed and paused, quickly recovering and following them up the road. Harry kept going, ignoring a branch off track that ended in the middle of a field and continued around a grove of trees. “Is that...” he squinted in the dark as they got closer to the flood lights. “Is this a building site?” he questioned before they were rammed hard again.

Their car skid dangerously along a dug out trench and tipped over. Harry braced his legs to stop himself from being knocked around too much. Next to him, Owen was gritting his teeth and doing the same thing to try and keep himself as stationary as possible. When it stopped, Harry wished his vision stopped spinning once the car did. He was shaking his head as the world kept tilting sideways when he looked around. He noticed the glass in the Frame was cracked on the roof below him, the Ultraviolet colour there flickering on and off. “Shit.” He groaned and unbuckled his seatbelt, regretting it when he fell towards the roof of the car. He regretted it even more when Owen joined him there in a tangle of limbs. Before he was able to answer, the door on the right side of the car was torn open and Owen was dragged out amidst a cacophony of raised voices. Harry was calling out to him, yelling, hearing thumps of flesh. He scrambled to crawl towards that side of the car.

And then froze when he heard the gunshot.

Harry heard nothing but silence in the world for a moment, then he heard screaming only realising the screams were coming from him when he felt the hot slick burn of his magic rising. He was dragged out next, and thrown to the ground next to his mission partner. Owen’s eyes were still open, but he wasn’t moving. He was gone. Harry’s eyes were burning. So were his arms, all the way down to his hands. He could feel his magic building in him, pelting and tumbling its way haphazardly towards his palms.

It all dispersed like a deflated balloon though, when the butt of a gun hit him on the back of his head and the world went from red to black.

“Sir? Before the Frame in the car got cut off, it managed to send the final scanned image. The coordinates don’t lead to much as the townsfolk in Korenevichi don’t really employ security cameras, but in a wider scan our Mainframe detected an electrical current. One that matches the standard settings for a security camera circuit.”

“Get in, I want to see what’s happening.”

“Already done Sir, transferring the image to you now.”

Draco’s hand covered his mouth as he watched the car his operatives had been in careening into a ditch, landing roof-side down after tumbling downhill. Draco turned to the nearest M-Tech he could see. “I want those coordinates. Get the coordinates of the Frame now!”

“The Frame is damaged, Sir, it stopped broadcasting. The last coordinates are from the scan transfer, which was six minutes away.”

There was a short flash of light on the screen, drawing Draco’s attention. In the Department, multiple people gasped, some breaking into sobs, having recognised what the source of the flash was.

Gunshot.

Draco felt himself take a step back, blindly reaching for the edge of his Station to stay upright, as he became unsettlingly aware of his own heartbeat. He heard himself speak from far away, feeling a little faint as they all watched one of their operatives fall still to the ground with a thump. “What about the car? Do we have a Tracker on that?”

The response was subdued. “The Frame was the Tracker and the car is off, Sir. No signal, but I think I can-”

Draco didn’t want to hear it. “Whatever it is, do it.”

Six hours.

Six hours ago the Department witnessed the murder of one of their operatives. Through the security footage, they saw Operative Seven get knocked out and dragged into the back of a van along with Operative Six’s... body.

Theo sent a group of his R-Techs with Operative Five, once Draco’s M-Tech was able to pinpoint the location attached to the electrical current of the security footage. The last scanned image had transferred six minutes before they’d connected to the cameras on the building site. At that time they’d been in a town called Korenevichi. On a satellite map, the closest building site to the town they’d passed was just off the P44. The team arrived seven minutes after the vans pulled out and disappeared from the cameras. All they’d found was the remains of a capsized car in a deserted building site. They’d collected all their gear and brought it home.

Six hours ago. And they hadn’t stopped working since.

“Sir, we’ve got movement on Abram’s residence in Bulgaria.” Draco’s attention, along with many others on the floor, snapped to the group near the back, working at their Station on ongoing surveillance of Abram Kuznetsov’s known compounds. The site in Bulgaria was the one Ow - Operative Six had not been able to find weeks ago when they sent him in for reconnaissance. “The Skoda just pulled in.”

Draco frowned in confusion. “He’s in Bulgaria? He was just in Belarus! What - does he have an illegal Portkey?” Bulgaria was at least a day’s drive away. Harry hadn’t mentioned anyone else using magic and no one without a significant magical signature could transport that much cargo with Apparition without raising flags. Kuznetsov was a wizard, maybe, but his magic ability didn’t show this kind of promise, all of his school records at Durmstrang Institute said so. He wasn’t wandless either.

“No travel of any magical kind would be possible with their cargo, Sir.”

Of course. “Bring up the footage. All of it, the whole security system.” He hadn’t even finished his order before there were multiple views from different cameras on the Frames before him. Draco walked along, looking at each one, seeing the car pull up, but not any of the trucks. “He left the trucks behind,” he said to himself. “Too much load? No - no, it’s important, but not time-sensitive. They sped ahead. Why?” He spotted Harry’s unconscious form being dragged from the van into the building, interrupting his thought process. He stepped back to look at all the frames and found movement in the last Frame on the left under his office upstairs.

Harry seemed semi-conscious by the time they hit the stairs, looking around and trying to get his feet under him to walk to the first storey of the building. Instead of going higher, they all stopped on the first floor, entering the view of a camera being fed to the third Frame, which turned down a corridor. The last door on the right, next to a window at the end, was open and the light was on. When they turned into it, Draco stepped back to view the Frame to his left. Harry seemed to deflate there, before he was dropped into a chair. Draco found himself surprised that there was sound from the video feed.

Abram Kuznetsov was a burly man. Like his henchmen, he dressed in a lot of layers, which made him look even bigger. Harry shut his eyes and turned away. He would not be intimidated by a murderer. Especially someone who still needed a wand. Though what he needed it in this room for, was puzzling. Harry could feel the familiar drain on his magic whenever he tried to bring it to the surface, had felt it thrashing against his skin as they’d brought him closer to the room. The isolated void in the room didn’t feel anything like Wiltshire, where he could reach for his magic and feel it simmering patiently beneath the surface, like a placid lake waiting for him to jump in once he returned to work. This wasn’t a natural boundary his magic respected.

This was a cage, one his magic didn’t appreciate being forced into it again.

Kuznetsov dragged a chair to sit opposite him, staring at the disarray of Harry’s person. The veritable bird’s nest of his hair, the dirt marks on his skin and scratches from the glass in the crash. He had tear tracks there too, since he’d just watched a good friend get murdered by the man in front of him. “Send Anton up,” he said and Harry’s gaze snapped to him confused. Who was he talking to? His men had left the room and closed the door behind them.

“My father was one of you,” Kuznetsov said ignoring his gaze. His voice was deep, his accent strong and Harry hated him. “He loved his tricks. Loved his drink, too.” Harry stared over the man’s shoulder and away to the wall, there was a red flashing LED light of a camera in operation. He wondered if Draco could see into the room. Tried to remember if he’d ever seen footage of this room by the surveillance team. “He was captured as a Deatheater,” Kuznetsov was saying as he finally put his wand away. Harry already felt his holster disengage earlier, his wand caught useless in his sleeve. He ignored it, hoping Kuznetsov wouldn’t see it since his arms were tied behind his back before he was sat down. “The Ministry let him go after the first war. I killed him myself just before the second.” He gestured to his left arm. “When his tattoo called to him.” The man snorted. “He was packing to leave, do you believe this?” he ranted, incredulous and huffed. “No one even noticed he was gone. I buried him under the dog pen.” He sat back on his chair, pausing for a moment when one of the men who’d been in the car with them came in and shut the door behind him. Harry watched him.

“You Anton?” he asked catching the minute moment of surprise at Harry knowing his name. Harry smiled internally.

Kuznetsov continued as if Harry hadn’t spoken. “They sent men for him, we told them he was dead. They asked for me instead, I said no. They killed my mother.” Abram leaned forward menacingly. “I’ve been killing _them_ ever since.” He watched Harry from head to toe as he sat back, surveying him calmly. “The weapons you are after, they are just a pastime,” he added gesturing abstractly with a hand. “Easy money.” His eyes narrowed. “But you’re not after weapons, are you?”

Kuznetsov pulled the chair closer to Harry. “I learned many things from my mother. She was a Chemist. Taught me everything I know about chemistry, the normal way.” Harry took note of how he said ‘normal’. He obviously meant the Muggle way. “Want to know what I learned from his side of the family? They were very proud to be magical. They were so happy when I got into their school in Bulgaria. Where did you go? Not the French one, for sure. American?”

The blond spiky-haired henchman, Anton, spoke up from the closed door. “He’s English. He spoke to the dead one when we ran them off road.” Harry shut his eyes. They’d dumped Owen in the trunk. He could still hear the body jostle every time they turned a corner.

Kuznetsov looked amused. “Ah, the one in Scotland.” He gestured at Harry. “You are powerful. I felt it when your friend died. It is why I actually got out of the car to hit you so hard. It felt like relief when you passed out. I wouldn’t bother with your magic in here. This-” He gestured around him. “-This is my safe room.” He rested his elbows on his thighs and leaned forward. “Nothing magical gets in here.”

Draco cut a sharp look at the Geo-Tracking Station. “What is he talking about?”

The M-Tech there gave him a rueful look. “Sir, he’s telling the truth.” She shook her head. “We tried to connect to the cameras like we usually do, but nothing happened. The only reason we are getting this video feed is because we had to access a connection with the wireless local area network _before_ it leads to that room.”

Another M-tech shook his head. “Seven didn’t activate his standard Tracker, and his wand must still be on his arm, but we can’t find it unless he uses it. Aside from the camera, which we got into from outside, we can’t get in. And if Operative 7 can’t get out of those restraints, he can’t get out either.”

Draco slammed his hands on his Station in frustration. “Well -” he scoffed in disbelief. “How the hell did he do _that_?” All the compounds and warehouses they’d found so far were completely magic-proof. This was just... “It’s one room in the _middle_ of a bloody building.”

“ _And how the hell did you do that?_ ” Harry was saying on the feed.

The man chuckled. “ _Did you know that there are parts of the world that magic cannot penetrate?_ ” Kuznetsov said as if he was disclosing a secret. “ _They call them Nulls._ ”

In the Department, Draco gasped, feeling a sensation of cold dread creeping across his skin. “No. That’s - that’s not possible.” He looked at Theo and Blaise. “In one room? On the _first floor_? How is that possible?” Theo shrugged helplessly.

Harry spoke then, humour in his voice. “ _I’ve heard of them._ ”

“ _Hmm, I bet your people stay far away from them._ ”

A small quirk of Harry’s mouth was visible. He looked at the camera for a split second and back. “ _You’d be surprised_.” Draco shook his head at Harry’s cockiness. “ _But they’re your people too._ ”

Even as he spoke, the look of rage that came over the man’s face was shocking in contrast to the serene look of before. Kuznetsov stood up and backhanded Harry as if the feeling couldn’t be contained anymore. Harry’s head snapped to the side, a rush of air escaping in surprise. His jaw was grabbed and he was forced to look him in the eye. “ _They..._ you _are_ not _my people_.” He hit him again with a closed fist this time. “ _And you, you are never going to see_ your _people again_.” He looked up at one of his men. “ _Bring the tools_.”

“Oh... what the actual fuck,” Blaise said putting his hands on his head in distress. “Are we about to witne-” He put a hand over his mouth when Harry was hit again. He looked like he was about to be sick.

“Get him out of there,” Draco said icily.

The M-Techs at the Tracking Station looked very frustrated. “Sir, when Operative 6... just before their crash, the images sent gave us their last known coordinates. They were still in Belarus before the Frame was destroyed.” The M-Tech sighed. “The signal for the closed circuit in the building is telling us he is in Bulgaria, Sir. There are no Nulls in Bulgaria. We’ve scanned every mile.”

“And if he is in a Null," another M-Tech added, "wherever he is, the building is not under _Fidelius_. Any spell that comes into contact with a Null is negated. So when Operative Six couldn’t find the compound in the coordinates of this feed, it wasn’t because it was hidden.”

“It’s because it wasn’t there.” Draco frowned looking at the screen, that icy feeling still encasing him. That meant their intelligence on Abram was wrong. He didn’t live in Bulgaria, which must be why Owen couldn’t find the site in the first place. “So he’s redirecting the signal of the cameras? Why? How could he possibly know we’d try to track him like that? We aren’t Muggles.”

“But he’s a Muggle criminal too,” Blaise said. Draco turned to him. “So he’s blocking Muggle attacks as well as ours.”

Draco made eye contact with an M-Tech. “Find out.” He got an affirming nod and turned back to the Mainframe. “Find a way,” he said to the room. “We are not about to watch while an Operative is tortured.” Not after watching one get murdered. Draco honestly didn’t know what was worse.

In the camera feed, Harry was looking up at the corner where the camera was. “ _So, no magic can find me, huh?_ ” he said like he was talking around liquid in his mouth. He laughed. “ _I Apparated into a Null once, hurt like a bitch. Trying to perform magic anywhere that it can’t penetrate hurts. But it’s still possible. So forgive me if I don’t believe you a hundred percent there, Abram._ ”

Kuznetsov’s eyes narrowed.

“ _It’s also possible to feel a Null approaching. Had a lot of experience in that respect. It’s like an itch in the back of your head, you know? It spreads like ice in your limbs and for some reason, always blacks out your most dominant hand last. But that’s in a natural environment._ ” He looked around the room from where he sat. “ _Place like this, it could take a while for it to really go away, ‘specially since it’s not based on the ground. More natural connection you see. And I had just enough time._ ”

Kuznetsov took a bracing step backwards. “ _Just enough time for what?_ ”

Harry smiled. “ _To enchant your goon to not lock the door._ ” As Kuznetsov turned to the door, Harry stood and threw down the ropes that had been securing his hands behind him. “ _Oh and to not tie my hands so tight._ ” He delivered a punch, swift and sure to get the man out of his way and made a dash for the door.

The goon was on the other side.

From the Department, there was a collective tensing as Harry was punched in the stomach hard enough to double over the man’s arm. Harry spat out blood and groaned before collapsing to the floor.

“Dammit,” Draco muttered as the sounds of Harry getting beaten up continued.

“ _That was supremely stupid. And all it did was make me angry._ ”

Harry rolled onto his back. “ _Ohhh, if I had a galleon..._ ” He laughed and winced as the movement pained him. “ _Can’t help it, Abram. It’s in my blood. Just like my magic. Go on, Blue._ ”

Draco frowned, turning to his Department and looking for the physical manifestation of his magic, seeing the little blue blob of magic raising up from his desk as if summoned. On the screen, Harry passed out, going quiet as he was kicked where he lay. “What the hell does that mean?” Draco said and had to avert his eyes when Harry passed out, getting so angry he slammed his fist down on the table. The resounding spread of blue light streamed across his desk to where Blue sat ‘watching’ the Mainframe. He turned a dark red before he blended in to the desk and shot across the short distance to the wall of the Mainframe. The camera feed of the men pulling Harry along the floor to the chair once more cut and switched to the other smaller Frames as the Mainframe started coming away from the wall.

“Draco... What is this?” Theo asked as the people gathered nearest started moving out of the way.

Draco shook his head. “I don’t know. This isn’t me.”

Theo cocked an eyebrow. “Are you sure? Because Blue doesn’t run on his own, Draco.”

Draco still didn’t have an answer for him. “Blue? Blue, what are you doing?” By then the Mainframe was laying on his Central Station as it always did when they ran a satellite search. As the feed began to pan over the Continent, running east from London, and sped over the water bypassing Germany, Poland and Belarus, a pulse of Blue’s light hit the floor and shot off, travelling in Blue’s tell-tale grid line pattern across the Ops main floor and up the stairs through the Administration Unit. Draco watched it all, beyond confused, at his magic’s behaviour.

“Is he-” Theo began.

“He’s scanning.” Blaise winced at the sounds on the screens around them as Harry was woken up with a bucket of water over his head. The feed on the main screen almost appeared to move faster than before. “He’s looking for him.” He looked to Draco, hopeful.

Draco sighed and closed his eyes, almost heartbroken at the desperation his magic was engaging in. “Blue, you won’t find him, Harry doesn’t leave a trail unless he going through an SME.” Which, tough luck, Harry hadn’t gone through a Spontaneous Wild Magic Eruption in months. Harry’d been getting better at controlling his magic, so he’d been eruption free since last year. Draco ran a hand through his hair in frustration. He shook his head and had to turn away, crossing his arms over his chest to give his hands something to do besides tremble.

“Why not?”

Draco tried his best to ignore the thumping sounds on the screen. “He never submitted his Wild Magic Signature to the DMLE, that’s why he was able to get away with hiding he was wandless for so long. And we certainly don’t keep an Operative’s WMS on file.” He took in a shaky breath. “We can’t track him that way.” They couldn’t track him in any way without a Tracker. And save Harry swallowing one, they couldn’t even guarantee a Tracker would suffice, especially when they were dealing with Nulls. It was beyond frustrating.

Theo gestured to the Mainframe. “Well, Blue doesn’t seem to think so.”

Draco sighed, shutting his eyes. “Blue is being delusional.” Draco gripped the bridge of his nose.

“Blue is you.” Draco opened his eyes to give Theo a hard stare. “How is he even doing all of this in one go? Since when do you have this much power?”

Draco shook his head. “He’s done this once before, he’ll burn himself out soon, and I’ll have a five day power nap. Little shit.”

Before Theo could reply, Blaise’s voice spoke up behind them. “Blue...” Blaise said moving closer to the Frame, “...is homing in on something.”

“That area’s about seven hours away from their last known coordinates, Sir.” The M-Tech from the Tracking Station sounded excited to convey the news. “Six if they were speeding.”

Theo and Draco turned from glaring at each other to the Mainframe. “That’s still impossible,” Draco said moving closer to see. “What the hell is he even using to track him? Harry’s WMS needs to be on the other side of a Track. We don’t have it, and he’s encased in a Null.” He watched as segments of the map were highlighted and zoomed in on until the Mainframe encompassed a town at the border between Belarus and Russia. “Foshnoye?”

“He plays with him.”

Draco turned to the voice, surprised to find out it was Charles. The brown-haired man was staring at the Mainframe along with the other M-Techs who’s eyes weren’t glued to the security feed. “What?”

Charles looked up at his Department Head. He blinked and seemed to shake himself from his thoughts. “Blue and Seven, they play all the time. Little games with their magic.” Draco looked down at the Mainframe, memories suddenly surfacing of things about Harry in the Department he’d dismissed before. Like Harry talking to him at his Station before suddenly he’d say, ‘ _Hey there little guy_ ’ and Draco would look up to see Harry swirling his finger around a purpling Blue with a fond smile. Or how he’d walk up to them while they were ridiculously playing catch - Harry throwing little balls of light at his magic assistant. “Blue distracts Harry whenever his magic level gets too high. I’ve seen it. Blue turns colour when he reacts to Seven’s magic and starts pulling at his hand.” Charles said and Draco remembered seeing that too, so many times.

“I’ve seen that too,” Five said. “Downstairs in the Medbay, Harry would be rubbing his hand like it was in pain and Blue would just turn up and do something that relieved it.”

Charles nodded. “Harry - we all - thought Blue just wanted to play.” Charles looked back at the Frame. There was a building being outlined in blue. “So he let him. Every time.” He huffed a breath. “He made a friend.”

 _“Aw, thanks little guy.”_ Harry was saying in his memory. _”Paper cuts hurt like a bitch. Good looking out. Bet Draco would have just rolled his eyes, like he’s doing now.”_

And Draco had rolled his eyes, when Harry seemed to turn even simple research into a blood sport, and ordered him to find something else to do besides mess up his Department. He’d played catch with Blue instead, to thank him for healing his finger, which had been bleeding at the time.

 _Son of a bitch._ “Go back,” Draco said startling the M-Tech at the surveillance Station. “The footage on the camera, can we go back?”

“I-er, yes, Sir, of course. To which part?”

“Harry’s attempted escape.”

Though they were confused, the M-Techs at the Station monitored the feed until they got to that specific point, broadcasting the video with a _Simulat_ to a Frame on the wall. Draco watched the replay while the other Frames continued to show the live feed. Harry was laying on the floor completely unconscious and damp and the men who’d been in the room were all gone except for two in conversation, including Kuznetsov.

In the Department, Blaise and Theo sidled up to Charles. “Don’t think I’ve heard you say so many words since your interview, Charles,” he heard Blaise say and ignored their conversation to focus on the footage. He watched closely as Harry doubled over coughing and narrowed his eyes when he spat. “Well, fuck me.”

Draco rested his hands against the Mainframe and leaned heavily. All this time. For weeks, _months_ there had been advancements in the Department, a sudden boost in performance for all their equipment. More control, more smoothness in Ops -- including this rampant display of power Blue was currently engaging in -- less explosions in R &D. More personally, there was Harry’s apparent control over his magic. And all of it was apparently because Harry Potter been playing with Blue, playing with Draco’s magic that was so intrinsically wound into the Department it was hard to tell it apart. Turned out Harry wasn’t gaining more control over the amount of magic he had.

He was sharing the fucking wealth.

 _For Merlin’s sake._ “Harry Potter... is fucking ridiculous.”

He listened to Harry laugh as he rolled on the floor in the recording. “ _Go on, Blue_ ,” the playback version of Harry said.

“ _What the hell is this?_ ” Kuznetsov’s irate voice said. All eyes in the room focused again on the live surveillance feed that had gone completely dark. The image then suddenly switched from black to green highlights.

Draco recognised it from the movies Harry made him sit and watch a few months ago. “He has night vision cameras? Paranoid Muggle.”

“ _Go check the generator!_ ” On the screen only the sound of shuffling around could be heard. When a door opened there was a faint amount of light from a window to the right of the door, blinding the camera. One of the men left as Kuznetsov stood in the doorway.

A commotion in the Department sounded upstairs in Administration when there was the loud slam of a door. They all turned at the sound and then at the irate cursing of a male voice. One Draco Malfoy knew well.

“What the actual fuck?! Where am I! Who are you people?” Everyone waited to see who the approaching voice was, and Draco’s suspicions were realised when he saw Ronald Bilius Weasley appear at the top of the stairs. “Will someone tell me what the bloody hell is going on?” The redhead raised his fists banging them against an invisible barrier that flashed blue whenever he pressed against it.

“Oh, Blue, you bloody traitor.”

“What the hell is going on and why can’t I leave this blue fucking circle?!” Ron started walking down the steps under supreme duress and Draco noticed as he did, there was indeed an outline of blue grid lines circling the redhead and leading him towards Draco’s Central Station. The confusion that took over the redhead when he saw Draco standing there looking as perplexed as the strangers around them seemed to short-circuit the Gryffindor’s brain. The shock of it comically postponed the anger as Ron approached the three Slytherins. “ _Malfoy?_ ,” he said, sounding almost calm as he cocked his head to the side in question.

“Weasley.” Draco didn’t really have any other words. He was too astonished.

“What the-” Ron didn’t get to say anything else as his hand was moving towards the Mainframe.

Realising what was happening, Draco’s eyes widened as he reached forward in alarm. “No, Blue! Don’t you force him int-” But it was too late.

With a flash of light, Ron was gone.

As soon as he disappeared, Blue rose up into his regular form at the edge of the Mainframe, not at all looking as if he’d just commandeered an Auror and thrown him into a vortex to Russia.

“ _The bloody hell? Malfoy! Where am I!_ ” Ron yelled from Russia.

“Blue, what the hell are you doing!” Draco hissed.

“ _Malfoy? Malfoy! Where are you? I know you’re there, I can hear you still!_ ”

Draco looked to his Department, who were all watching wide eyed at what was going on. None of them seemed to have any input on this sequence of ridiculous events. “Weasley, I’m so sorry. I don’t know what the hell Blue is on.”

“ _Who the hell is-_ ”

Draco held up his hand to silence the redhead, but put it down when he remembered Ron wouldn’t see it. “No, not important. Right now it’s an emergency. I think he wants you to go after Harry.” Draco rested his hands on the Frame again, this time allowing the magic inside to leak over his hands. He raised them to pull up the three dimensional image and saw Ron standing on the roof in miniature form.

There was a pause as Ron narrowed his eyes at nothing. “ _Harry_.” He said it how Draco had come to say that name. As if its very presence explained every strange thing he’d so far encountered. As if just the sound of the syllables exhausted him.

Draco sighed and nodded in kind. “Yeah.”

There was now a knowing tone laced in Ron’s words. “ _Harry works with you._ ” It wasn’t even a question. It sounded more like an altogether inevitable realisation.

Draco answered it anyway. “‘Fraid so. And he’s in that building Blue just dropped you on.”

“ _I fucking knew something was going on._ ” The image in front of them put his hand on his hip as the other ran through his hair. Ron sighed. “ _He’s in this building?_ ” Ron looked around for a roof entrance. “ _Can you direct m- oh no, wait, nevermind those blue grid line things are here. Thanks._ ” And like a true Gryffindor, and best friend of Harry-fucking-Potter, the redhead simply ignored the surrealty of the situation and followed the gridlines to the door.

Draco, Blaise and Theo stood back from the Mainframe and looked at each other incredulously. “What?” they said in tandem. As Ron passed the door frame, the image before them stripped away the rooftop, which rose and hovered above their heads within the boundary of the Mainframe and they followed the three dimensional floor plan of the storey Ron was on. The whole building was dark, but the walls outlined in the Mainframe rose up in green, the faded dark areas highlighting where the cameras couldn’t see. Draco bit into his bottom lip. If they could see it, that meant anyone watching could see it too. Weasley needed to hurry.

“ _What?_ ” Ron said, now whispering. The image showed him crouching to look around a corner. They could hear voices coming from that direction. “ _Malfoy, am I in Russia?_ ” Was that a note of excitement in his voice? “ _Holy shit._ ” There was a breathless chuckle. “ _Should you be talking while I’m sneaking around in here?_ ” he said as he made his way stealthily down the corridor.

If he weren’t so worried, Draco would be impressed. “No one else can hear us. Did you say Blue is there?” Draco looked at the small blob of magic that still sat at the edge of the Frame. The top of Blue had bent over the image, like he was watching what was going on, too.

“ _I’m guessing this Blue is the blue grid-lined menace that kidnapped me_ ,” Ron muttered, before raising his wand to cast a disillusionment spell on himself. The image faded Ron out but his outline was still there as he plastered himself against a wall to let a Muggle with a flashlight pass him. Ron took the steps to the second floor, the third separating and flying upward to join the roof above them. “ _in that case, yes, it is, and it seems to be invisible to everyone too. It also seems to be leading me somewhere._ ” The floor plan spread out, loading all the rooms and corridors that had cameras in and around them. At the end of the corridor, where light shone in through the window, there was a room to the right that pulsed with blue light. Draco narrowed his eyes at the open door of the room and looked up at the identical room on the camera feed.

“Yeah. To his best friend, apparently,” Draco muttered.

“ _What was that?_ ”

“Nothing. I’m sending a Medical team to meet you and Portkey back here.” He signalled to Charles who nodded and moved away to do just that.

“ _A Medical team? Why-” There was an Holy fucking Merlin. Harry? Harry?! Can you hear me?_ ” There was panic creeping into his voice and Draco needed to curb it before it got out of control.

“Get him out of the room, Weasley. They’ve bound the room, get him out. When the Medteam gets there they can stabilise him for transport.”

“ _Come on, mate, let’s get out of here._ ” There was strain now. The room was still dark, but they could see a faint outline of their figures as Ron hauled Harry up and they inched closer to the door where there was moonlight on the corridor. “ _Can he take a side-along like this?_ ”

“It doesn’t matter, the Medteam can fix whatever you break. You just have to get him out of the room.”

“ _Is that why your blue whatsit is waiting out there? Can’t it come in?_ ” Ron forced out as he pulled Harry’s dead weight along with him.

Draco shook his head. “I’ve given up trying to understand what Blue is doing right- Blue what are you doing _now_?” He watched as Blue’s rounded point at his tip zeroed in on the image of Ron pulling Harry closer to the door. With every inch, Blue turned darker, pulsating with energy.

“ _Er, Malfoy, the gridlines are getting darker and they’re kind of pulsing on the floor. I can feel them vibrating. Is that supposed to happen?_ ” On the image in the Mainframe and on the video feed Ron had stopped just before the frame of the door. In the Department, Blue wasn’t moving.

Except... he was. Ron was struggling to keep Harry upright and every time he heaved the brunet against his shoulder, Blue moved minutely, following the movement. Something occurred to him.

“What colour are the gridlines?”

“What does that-” Draco silenced Blaise with a hand.

“ _They’re turning purple, why?_ ”

Next to the Mainframe, the pulsating vibration Draco could both see and feel had spread to the floor next to him and was beating almost to the rhythm of a heartbeat, the purpling gridlines shaking with every pulse. “He’s bringing him here,” Draco said absently, staring at the floor.

Blaise and Theo looked at each other. “That’s not supposed to be possible. We’re still in the Ministry,” Theo said, but it didn’t stop him from taking off in the direction Charles had gone.

Draco bent to Blue’s level and watched the physical manifestation of his Wild Magic as it seemed to be gathering energy for something Draco wasn’t even prepared to understand. They’d sent Harry through numerous times, but Draco didn’t ever think they could bring someone _back_ “Blue?” Blue didn’t move and Draco moved his hand to slide a little closer.

“ _Gonna need an answer soon, Malfoy, someone’s coming, I can hear angry voices._ ”

“Blue?” Draco said softly, ignoring Weasley for the moment. “Are you sure this is safe?” Blue still didn’t move, but Draco waited. The tight, rigid stance of his magic made it seem like it wasn’t even acknowledging him, but soon he felt a pulse of energy bump into his hand. That simple action sent his mind back to his scared, younger self after he’d just managed to get the Mainframe to work for the first time in his small, shared closet of an office. He’d sat down, feeling accomplished and exhausted in equal measure, only to feel a foreign energy bump into his hand and startle the life out of him. He’d felt it then and thousands of times over the years since he’d first encountered this little blob of energy that followed him around everyday. Now, it seemed to be in love with Harry Bloody Potter. _Oh, how they grow so fast._

Draco smiled. That was enough for him. “Okay then.” He stood up. “Weasley. Get in the circle.”

There was a pause. “ _Alright. Why not._ ” As soon as he stepped out of the door, the image on the Mainframe cut out, the magic there flowing from the Frame to the floor where Blue’s purple circle pulsated. After a short pause, just as seamlessly as Ron had fallen in, he and Harry came back out. Draco and Blaise rushed to help Ron hold him up as he stumbled. Behind them all, the Mainframe rose slowly to secure itself back to the wall.

“Holy mother of Merlin,” Theo said astonished at what he’d just witnessed as he entered the room with Charles and the Medical team. He stepped aside to let them through. “Has it always been able to do that?” he asked as they passed him by.

Waiting was bullshit.

Draco sat back in his rarely used desk chair at his central Station. The whole Ops floor was subdued. The M-Techs that stayed behind to monitor the missions for Operatives One through Four were talking to them in hushed tones when they needed to, otherwise they were at their own Stations watching the same footage as Draco.

The Medical Team that Blaise had outsourced from St Mungo’s had worked on Harry for hours. The Gryffindor had broken bones and fractures, multiple lacerations and his whole body seemed to be one big bruise. After the Medteam had taken him, Draco endured Weasley’s raving tantrum in silence until Blaise had the redhead removed. Since then, Draco stayed. He worked at his Station, and he slept in his office, Blue sticking to his side wherever he went. Blaise and Theo took it in turns to bring him food, sending Charles when he got tired of them mothering him.

He was currently sitting at his desk, watching on multiple Frames the systematic deconstruction of Kuznetsov’s various hideouts. All of them were resistant to magic, somehow. It made him angry just thinking about them. His M-Techs had taken great offence on his behalf and a variety of technicians from Ops and R&D had volunteered to tear the places apart while he, and the rest of the Department, watched. It was soothing in a way, knowing these torture chambers were being destroyed. They’d found... _remains_ in a number of them, blood and other fluids in the majority. Some of the M-Techs suggested burning and salting the lot at one point.

When he was tired of watching the destruction, he’d turn to watch Harry instead. The last Frame that sat under the glass of his office wall had a constant stream of the Medbay. Harry was unconscious, the Medical team had placed him in a coma to heal. They suggested to Draco that when Harry woke up, he should talk to someone, even if they weren’t a professional.

Merlin.

Draco heaved a sigh and ran a hand down his face in exhaustion, wishing he had hard liquor stashed somewhere in his desk. A flurry of movement caught his attention and he looked to his right as Theo and his Senior R-Tech, Gemma Farley, came up the stairs from R&D. Theo had been working on something with a small group of them for days since Harry’s return. He knew as soon as they had a breakthrough, they’d come and tell him. Looked like this would be it. He turned to Blue, who’d been stationed at his side on the desk, swaying with him as Draco turned his desk chair left and right. “Go sit with him. Let me know if anything happens.” Blue sank into the desk without any further prompt, not that he even needed that these days, and Draco saw him appear next to the hospital bed on the screen. Knowing Blue was there made it easier for Draco to pay attention as Theo got closer. He took his feet off the top drawer he’d propped his feet on, pushed it in and sat up properly.

“...and I think it’s ready for us to show him now,” Farley was saying. Draco remembered her from school, she’d been a Prefect. He’d hired her because he knew how smart she was, how she always looked at the finer details, and that she only joined the Quidditch team as a chaser because her parents told her she needed to socialise. Theo gestured to her with his head and she took off back to the stairs. Draco watched her go with a cocked eyebrow.

Theo looked up at the Frames. All the destruction was still going on and their technicians were making a proper go of it with the sledgehammers in their hands. The Mainframe in the middle showed the house in Russia they’d kept Harry in. Yesterday they found out that Kuznetsov’s men had moved Owen Cauldwell’s body from the car wreck and put him in one of the rooms on the ground floor. An R-Tech proposed using an explosive to demolish it all when they found him. Theo had stopped them because of something to do with the walls. Hence the impromptu demolition site. That was two days ago. “I have something to show you.”

Draco figured as much. He sighed and looked up at his friend and colleague.

“Harry will be fine. Blue’s with him, right? I saw you send him off as I came over here. So stop pretending you’re not gonna follow me.” He leaned against the desk. “Gryffindor’s don’t go down like this. Especially this one.”

“I don’t need a pep talk, Theo.”

Theo looked him over. “No. No you need a distraction. Come with me.” Draco rolled his eyes. "I can wheel your chair _down_ the stairs for you if you'd prefer." Draco stood up with a huff, and followed Theo down the stairs into the R &D main floor. When they entered, it was to see Gemma Farley, making minor adjustments to a bunch of Muggle microscopes on one of the R-Tech Stations, most likely her own. “Ready?” Theo asked Gemma. She smiled and nodded. Draco looked between them and cocked an eyebrow. Theo rolled his eyes and gestured to the first microscope. “What’s this?”

“Why are you using Muggle microscopes?”

Theo’s expression turned deadpan. “Just look.”

Draco tutted and bent over to take a look at what Theo was showing him. “Stone. Looks like limestone, actually.” He glanced up at the Frame to see Gemma bring up a pictorial display of the chemical compound. “Oh, yeah, CaCo3. Calcium carbonate.”

“Hmm, well done. And this?”

Draco waited for him to move to take a look. More stone. He looked up at the Frame again. “SiO2...” he said to himself as his brain worked. “Silicon? Some kind of sand or rock crystal?”

“Alright. Last one. This?” He didn’t bother to make Draco look, instead switched to the next pictorial form of the compound on the Frame.

“Al2Si...” Draco sighed “Some kind of aluminium silicate. What is this Theo?”

Theo look unusually excited. His hands were bunched into fists as he punctuated the word, “ _Cement_. It’s a partial gathering of the ingredients used in cement.”

That manic look in his eyes didn’t bode well. Glancing at Gemma, Draco only saw her amusement, but there was an undercurrent of excitement there too. “Okay...”

Theo held up his hands in a surrendering pose. “Bear with me.” They watched as Gemma adjusted the magnification. “Look here again,” he said when Gemma was done. “Look _between_ the dead organisms in the limestone. See those dark spaces?” When Draco nodded, Theo moved him to the next microscope after Gemma adjusted the magnification there too. “Now here, between the silica. See that?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay.” He stepped back and Gemma gestured Draco to the other side of the station. There was a tray there with more samples all under their own microscope. “Look in here.”

Draco was seriously beginning to doubt Theo’s sanity. “Where did you get all these microscopes from?”

“Just _look_ Draco.”

Draco stepped up and leaned over the eye pieces. He sighed. “It’s the same Theo, what- wait-” He stopped himself and went back to the slide. He recognised that. He’d spent weeks with Theo poring over this last year. “This is the... is this the dust particles from the explosion at the _Allée Vertic_?” It wasn't hard to get samples of it last year. Everyone affected at the hospital had it on their clothes.

“Exactly.”

“I don’t get it.”

“Neither did I, until _she_ pointed it out.”

Draco turned to Gemma, waiting to the side. She gestured to the stairs. “I’ll explain on the way.” Draco looked at Theo. Theo seemed so excited though it was tempered by a determination he hadn’t seen in a while. It was like there was actually something he was trying to say but he was holding it in so that Gemma could have her moment. For that reason alone, Draco shut his mouth, shook his head and followed Farley to the stairs. “When we got those blasted samples from _Allée Vertic_ ,” she began, “we theorised that the resistant materials were used so that if the explosive was found, any magical person who attempted to neutralise it would fail.”

Draco remembered that theory. “Makes sense,” he said as they traversed the stairs.

Farley hummed in agreement. “Naturally, when we got our hands on them, some of us also theorised that we could use them for our own gain.”

“Imagine,” Theo said clearing the bottom step and turning to him, as if he couldn’t hold it in anymore. “Protection from spells, any spell, even an Unforgivable,” he concluded walking backwards slowly.

Draco did imagine. The possibilities of something like that was incredible. “Shit,” Draco said stopping by the Notice Board. His eyes went immediately to the Medical Bay to their left. Five was sitting at the Nurse’s station, absently doing the exercises Theo had set out for him, he was talking quietly to Weasley, who was eating from a tray, while staring into the transparent glass of the ICU.

Theo’s eyes joined him. “Yeah,” he echoed, his voice sounding far away.

“This way,” Gemma said drawing them away and past the pool. “The anomalies themselves - the dark spaces under the microscope - aren’t really the compound making up the materials, rather they’re just... voids moving between the _atoms_ of the elements within the compound. It doesn’t change at all when a compound is created. When Operative Seven Apparated into a Null last year, he landed on the road and made contact with parts of the soil. Because he had trace amounts of Mr Madley’s Wild Magic on his clothes, we had to quarantine them, see if we could remove the magic from them. We couldn’t. We didn’t think anything of it, we just thought that it was because of the nature of the magic and simply archived the clothing in our vault.

“Sure.” Draco remembered that. They bypassed the pool and walked straight to the tactical practise area.

“But then Operative Seven was held captive by Abram Kuznetsov.” She shook her head like the next part frustrated her. “We didn’t understand how he could just _create a Null_ out of nowhere. It’s completely unprecedented. We found the answer in his mother. Well, and the back of the trucks when they decided to show up.” Swiping at the Frame by the entrance, the maze walls that the operatives used during drills began retracting into the ground.

Draco watched them go down, idly. “Explain.”

“Don't you see, Draco?" Theo asked. "He said she was a chemist.” Draco remembered the chemical compounds he was just asked to recognise. “The dust, the blasted rock from _Le Place en Pierre_ , his room, his stupid compounds, they're all the same." Theo said it like a revelation. "It was all him and the damn source of it is in the second set of samples you saw under the microscope from-”

“Allée Vert...” He trailed off when Theo and Gemma started shaking their heads with smiles.

“The first samples you saw were from the trace elements we got from Harry’s clothes when Weasley brought him back from Russia. They just finished analysing it. The second set... was from when he landed in Wiltshire with Madley.”

The shock on Draco’s face spoke for itself. There was a beep to signify the complete retraction of the maze walls. On the far wall hung an open wooden box. The front of the box had a thin layer of glass with holes in the top. There was a folded piece of material laying above and... “Is that a rat?”

“Unfortunately yes. We needed a test subject and found him running about in the sewers.”

Draco turned to Theo. “Test subject for what?” What was he about to witness?

Theo remained serious. Gemma was the one to speak. “Cast a spell on the rat.” Before Draco could open his mouth, she hushed him. “Stop arguing and just do it.”

Draco took out his wand and aimed at the glass pane. “ _Immobulus_ ” From where he stood, he could see the rat freeze unnaturally still. “Is it okay?”

Theo waved off the concern, pulling out his wand. “He’s fine. _Finite_.” Farley walked over to the box and took down the material on top. It looked like cloth, but there was a sheen to it that peeked Draco’s curiosity. She hung the material over the front of the box, obscuring the rat.

Theo stood to his side. “Cast something now. Don’t miss. Gemma’s too precious.”

Draco snorted and repeated the immobilising spell. It hit the material head on. Gemma raised it. The rat was unaffected. “The hell...”

“Yeah.” He beckoned Gemma back, who let the material fall again and walked over.

“How?”

“When Harry was brought back from Berlin, and we found those voids in the traces in his clothes. We now see they're so similar to the voids from the Allée incident, so the team got his and Madley's clothes back from the vault to test them. All three were so similar that we needed more materials to test so, at Farley’s request, we sent a group of techs to your Null in Wiltshire.

“Wasn’t fun,” Gemma commented. “Couldn’t even use a _Defodio_ ,” she added, mournfully shaking her head.

Theo snorted. “They dug up samples from the soil and analysed them using a...” He looked to Gemma for the term.

“Mass Spectrometer,” she said.

Theo looked as if the words alone could cause a headache. “Right... that, to identify all the natural elements occurring in the soil. We found that the voids you saw in the samples upstairs occur naturally in each of the elements, not just the compounds. The limestone, the chalk, the sand... Kuznetsov discovered this, then mixed them into the concrete and used it to build rooms, complete spaces that are resistant to magic, resistant to Tracking - whole enclosed spaces occurring outside of nature. And he did it with Muggle chemistry.”

Draco needed to sit down. “He dug up building materials from Nulls and made them into concrete structures... to hide?”

They both nodded. “So we did it too,” Gemma said.

“How?” He looked again to the rat behind the piece of glass and material.

“The voids swallow the magic. They’re in the soil, the stone. But they also occur in the metals. Tampering with them doesn’t affect the structure at all. It’s just a natural occurrence.”

“Kuznetsov was smart, but he was thinking very small,” Gemma said. She took a deep breath. “Now, we couldn’t use magic, that’s why this took so long and why we have such a small sample - but we were able to extract the metals from the soil. We needed a large amount of it-”

Draco held up his hands. “Guys, get to the point.”

Both of them exchanged a look and then used their hands to make a ‘tada’ motion to the box on the wall. “We wove the metals into a yard breadth of material,” Gemma concluded. “Galvanised zinc electroplated chromium threads, all homemade from the geographical Null in Wiltshire.”

Draco’s eyebrows rose. “That’s a mouthful.”

Theo and Gemma shared another look. At Gemma’s nod, Theo raised his wand. “Yeah, but it allows us to do this.” He pointed his wand towards the rat behind the cloth. “ _Avada Kedavra_!”

At the bright blast of green, Draco’s heart nearly leapt out of his chest. “Fucking _Christ_! Theo!” He’d actually turned to redundantly shield himself from the spell.

Theo was near vibrating with the effort of holding back. “Go check.” He said it in a whisper, his eyes wide in excitement. Draco looked at the material over the box. There was no way... He swallowed around the lump in his throat and made his way across the floor. When he reached the hanging box, he hesitantly reached a hand out and raised an edge of the material.

The rat was fine. _Alive_

With a hand over his mouth and his breath stuck in his throat, Draco turned around. Water gathered in his eyes. “Oh my god.”

“Gemma wants to name the material after Cauldwell somehow.” Theo smiled, an arm thrown around Gemma’s shoulders. His grin was bright, but his eyes were also filling with water. “We’ll have to do a shitload of testing, obviously. But we aren’t losing anyone else, Draco.”

_Oh. I know that ceiling._

Harry closed his eyes again to stop the world from spinning around. He brought a hand up to shield his eyes from the light of the room and took in a deep breath. It was quiet, warm and the familiar view of the whorling pattern in the grid-panel ceiling was comforting. He smiled. Waking up in the Medbay meant it worked, Blue had found him. He’d known as soon as Kuznetsov’s goon Anton had come in the room, that the camera had sound, that they were listening to the recording. If it worked, then The CMI could have been listening too. It was a gamble, but if he hadn’t taken the chance, he’d be dead.

Like Owen. _Oh god._ Harry squeezed his eyes shut tighter under the shield of his hand to prevent the telltale prickle progressing into full on tears. Owen was gone. They’d have to... _Shit. Where’s his body? Did they-_

A rustle to the left made Harry turn his head and chance opening his eyes again. In the visitor’s chair to the left, where he always found Draco, Harry saw him reading a broadsheet. The newspaper seemed to comically take up the whole corner, obstructing his view.

Well, best to get it over with. “Oh god you’re so angry you can’t even focus on me this time?”

There was a tensing behind the pages, the hand closest to him tightening around the print. A short pause, and then, “Oh I’m angry alright.”

The voice did not match the man, as it wasn’t a man at all. Harry became incredulous, his head raising from the pillow as the broadsheet collapsed uncaringly to reveal his best friend. “Hermione?” he exclaimed in shock.

“Oh he’s awake is he? Did you yell at him yet?” came from the direction of the door. Harry turned his head, the world taking a moment to catch up. Ron was standing at the door to the room, a pastry in his hand.

Hermione’s eyes narrowed. “Not yet.”

Ron nodded once. “Lovely. Let me just get settled in.” True to word, Ron came in, conjured a chair on the opposite side and sat down comfortably.

Harry’s head didn’t know which way to turn, nor if he could survive the dizziness of watching them both. “What are you both doing here?”

Hermione placed a hand on her chest as if she was surprised he asked. The sarcasm wasn’t new. In a way it was comforting because he knew them both well enough to know that they were mad, but not mad enough to blank him completely. “Oh. _I_ was called because my husband was kidnapped from his Department _five days ago_ , forced into a lift and not seen for _twelve hours_ ,” she summarised with a fake grin. “I was beside myself until a young man named Charles came to collect me on orders from Minister Kingsley and the Head of the CMI.” The glint in her eye told him she knew who the Head was, too. “How come I’ve never heard of the CMI, Harry?” she asked sweetly.

“Yeah Harry,” Ron piped up from the other side of the bed. “How come we’ve never heard of it?” He bit in to his pastry.

Hermione winced. “Did I say ‘I’?”

Ron nodded and swallowed. “You did.” He shrugged. “It’s intelligence, love, I forgive the slip up.”

Hermione sighed with a smile. “Man of my dreams, that one,” she said to Harry and looked at Ron in turn. “You get me so well.”

Ron smiled beatifically. “I know.” He waggled his eyebrows.

Harry wasn’t sure what was going on anymore. “Er...”

“Oh, you’re awake then.” Harry raised his head once more to look down the length of his body towards the entrance of the room. Draco was leaning against the open doorway and stepped in once he announced his presence.

Harry let his head drop back to the pillow and stared at the ceiling some more. Great more telling off. “Beginning to wish I wasn’t.”

He missed Draco narrowing his eyes at him. “Blue saved your life. I didn’t even know what was happening. Which is a little frightening, I’ve got to say.”

Harry shook his head where it lay on the pillow. “He’s still you.” He looked up at Draco. “You should trust your magic. Like I do.”

Draco put down the file he was carrying on the nearest rolling table. He leant against the bed frame. “You took a gamble that we were even watching you.”

Harry rolled his eyes. “Of course you were watching. You’ve been monitoring him via his security footage and CCTV for months. And if you were watching-”

Draco nodded along with the tailend of Harry’s narration. “Blue had to know, too.”

“Mmm.”

“Blue was able to Track you.” The question of how went unsaid.

Harry smiled. “You said giving my WMS to you was dangerous. But not being able to find me is also dangerous, Draco. So I gave it to the next best thing. Blue knows my magic inside out. Made sure of it.”

“You said we were in a Null though.” Ron said turning to Draco. Harry wondered at the lack of animosity there. Was the inclusion of the secret of the Department so spectacular that Ron forgot Harry had been lying to him for so long, that he’d been working for Draco Malfoy? “You can’t Track someone in a Null, whether you have the signature or not.”

Draco shook his head. “Harry’s magic works for him unlike any other Wizard I’ve seen.” His gaze fell upon Harry. “It knows you, can predict you and keeps you safe, like your subconscious keeps track of your knowledge and actions and forewarns you with that ominous feeling of wrongness that makes your hair stand on end.” Harry nodded, knowing that feeling. “It runs through your blood like a fever.” Draco smirked. “And you spat that blood on the floor _outside_ of the confines of the room.” Draco turned back to Ron. “It was all Blue needed.”

Harry’s smile widened. “So it worked.” He felt proud his plan had succeeded.

Draco narrowed his eyes again, cutting Harry’s celebratory moment short. “Don’t do it again,” he said seriously.

Harry held a hand to his heart and outlined an ‘X’ on it. “Cross my heart.”

Draco looked fed up, rolling his eyes for effect. “I’m going back to work. We have a lot of paperwork to get through to make sure Abram pays for what he’s done. We were able to arrest him and Theo’s R-Techs are relishing the term demolition like it’s an art form.” He handed Ron the folder he was carrying. “Give this to Blaise when you’re done, Weasley. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Harry’s brow furrowed at the conversation. “Tomorrow?”

Ron looked up from the folder he’d opened and grinned. “Oh I didn’t get a chance to tell you? I’m joining your team.”

Hermione smiled. “Apparently he has an excellent reference,” she said and looked at Draco. Harry joined her.

Ron let the folder rest on his lap and held his hands in front of him like he was holding an invisible ball. “The little blob of magic you guys call Blue? He won’t let me leave.” His hands fell to rest on the documents in the folder his legs were holding up. “I’ve been here for a week already. Been sleeping in Blaise’s office.” He scoffed and went back to reading.

“Hence me coming here,” Hermione continued to explain, “as under Wizengamot Law, we are one,” she added gesturing between Ron and herself. “Said so in the vows we took. And, if my husband was held prisoner until he signed a contract to become an Office Operative, so was I.” She grinned. “The mini vacation has been excellent, though.” Her eyes widened in excitement. “I’ve learnt so many things,” she said touching Harry’s arm, “like exactly what I’m going to do to you for keeping this a secret from me.” Her smile was stuck in place. A promise.

Harry decided to ignore that threat, and frowned at the new term. “Office Operative?”

Ron looked up and said delicately, “Yeah, I’m...replacing the OO-6.” He turned a page gauging Harry’s reaction.

Harry knew why. Owen’s designation. There would have to be a funeral. For that they’d need a body. “Did we get him back?” Draco nodded silently from where he stood. Harry swallowed around the lump in his throat. He may definitely need an appointment with that Mindhealer. He made a note to ask Draco later.

In the meantime. “Office Operative. OO, as in Double-O?” Harry’s eyes brightened at the term, he couldn’t help it. His gaze centred on Draco, who had his arms crossed and was leaning against the door frame again. The blond cocked an eyebrow at him, winked and left.

Hermione giggled next to him. “I’m not going to lie Ron, I’m very much liking you having the title of Double-O 6. In the franchise he was even Double-O Seven’s best friend.” She smiled at Harry.

“What franchise?” Ron said confused.

Harry shared a glance with Hermione, his heart bursting with a happiness that couldn’t be contained with a simple smile. He wiped at his eyes. “Oh mate,” he said with feeling. “I have so much to teach you.”

-Fin-

**Author's Note:**

> flagrate - writes words in a flaming orange colour  
> geminio - duplicates items, you have to stop the duplications with a finite incantatem though, or it'll keep duplicating.  
> simulat - makes a simulated copy of something  
> defodio - scoops out large amounts of dirt, a digging charm so to speak  
> immobulus - freezes an object/person/animal into immobility  
> repello muggletum - repels muggles from an area by diverting their attention  
> capacious extremis - expands the area of a space by *giggles* making it bigger on the inside  
> enarratio - scans objects and persons internally to be interpreted by the CMI Mainframe


End file.
